Brain Cancer

Reporting from Paris -- When he was diagnosed with a malignant brain tumor 20 years ago, David Servan-Schreiber, the French-born doctor, neuroscientist and later bestselling author, took the phrase "physician, heal thyself" to heart. Submitting to the punishing traditional treatments of chemotherapy and radiotherapy, he still felt there was something more he could do to enhance his chances of survival. FOR THE RECORD: An earlier version of this article incorrectly reported the name of David Servan-Schreiber's wife in the list of survivors and omitted two children.

Gary Carter, a Hall of Fame catcher from Fullerton who helped lift the New York Mets to a dramatic victory over the Boston Red Sox in the 1986 World Series, died Thursday in Florida. He was 57 and had brain cancer. Nicknamed "Kid" for his grit and youthful exuberance, Carter was an 11-time All-Star who hit .262 with 324 home runs and 1,225 runs batted in during 19 seasons playing for the Montreal Expos, Mets, San Francisco Giants and Dodgers. His goal to become a major league manager unfulfilled, Carter was coaching at Palm Beach Atlantic University near his Florida home last May when he experienced headaches and forgetfulness and was diagnosed with brain cancer.

Gary Carter, a Hall of Fame catcher from Fullerton who helped lift the New York Mets to a dramatic victory over the Boston Red Sox in the 1986 World Series, died Thursday in Florida. He was 57 and had brain cancer. Nicknamed "Kid" for his grit and youthful exuberance, Carter was an 11-time All-Star who hit .262 with 324 home runs and 1,225 runs batted in during 19 seasons playing for the Montreal Expos, Mets, San Francisco Giants and Dodgers. His goal to become a major league manager unfulfilled, Carter was coaching at Palm Beach Atlantic University near his Florida home last May when he experienced headaches and forgetfulness and was diagnosed with brain cancer.

Eleanor Mondale, the vivacious daughter of former Vice President Walter Mondale who was a television entertainment reporter, radio show host and occasional magnet for gossip, died Saturday at her Minnesota home, a family spokeswoman said. She was 51. "Our wonderful daughter … after her long and gutsy battle against cancer, went up to heaven last night," the former vice president said in a statement emailed to friends. Mondale had left her job co-hosting a weekday morning radio show in Minneapolis in 2009 when she announced the return of brain cancer.

In the short time they've been around, cellphones have changed the world. Just 20 years ago -- if you can believe it -- you had to discuss dinner plans before you arrived at the grocery store. And just 20 years ago, you didn't have to field work calls until you were actually at work. Cellphones gave us new ways to stay connected. For some, they also provided a new reason for worry. Cellphones release microwave radiation when they're in use, a fact that inevitably led to fears of brain cancer.

Brain tumors may soon encounter a new weapon. The Food and Drug Administration has approved a new device that uses electrical energy to kill brain cancer cells. The device, approved for those who have malignant tumors known as glioblastoma multiforme, adds a potential new alternative to chemotherapy for patients with advanced brain tumors. The device, called NovoTTF, delivers low-intensity electrical fields directly to a patient’s scalp via four electrodes. The electrical fields appear to interfere with the process of cell division, halting the tumor’s growth.

The Food and Drug Administration approved the first significant new treatment for brain cancer in two decades--a drug that is inserted into brain tissue from which a tumor has been removed. The procedure fights malignant glioma, a fast-spreading cancer that affects about 8,000 people in America each year, by delivering the drug directly to the tumor site in high concentrations. The disease has proved resistant to conventional treatment methods like surgery and radiation.

Brain cancer has increased by up to 500% among elderly Americans, a trend that an expert at the National Cancer Institute calls "alarming" because the disease is almost always fatal. "It once was considered that brain tumors reached a peak rate (among people in their 30s) and then would rapidly decline in the older population, but it now appears that the incidence continues to increase with age," said Nigel H. Greig, a National Institute on Aging researcher. "I think it is alarming."

The development of brain cancer is strongly linked to the lack of a protein that repairs DNA damage, University of Washington researchers have found. The protein, known as MGMT, defends brain cells against damage caused by nitrosamines, a cancer-causing chemical found in such products as beer, bacon and tobacco smoke. Many people who develop brain tumors lack enough MGMT to repair DNA damage caused by those agents, the researchers said.

A Los Angeles hospital has given UC Irvine a $208,000 grant for research into the use of the body's immune system to combat brain cancer. The grant from the Hospital of the Good Samaritan in Los Angeles to UCI's Cancer Research Institute will support basic studies by Gale Granger, a professor of molecular biology and biochemistry. Granger's approach to the battle against brain cancer is threefold.

The daughters of two legendary Democratic politicians have died: Kara Kennedy, the oldest child of the late Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, and Eleanor Mondale, the daughter of former Vice President Walter F. Mondale. Both women had been battling cancer. Their deaths were announced by their families Saturday, according to the Associated Press. Kennedy, 51, died at a health club in the Washington area, said her brother, Patrick Kennedy, a former Democratic congressman from Rhode Island.

The first-ever study comparing brain cancer incidence in kids who use cellphones with those who do not has found no difference, suggesting that children's long-feared vulnerability to brain cancer with early cellphone use does not exist. In a four-country study published this week in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute, researchers matched 352 children and adolescents diagnosed with brain cancer with 646 similar kids who were healthy, and compared their patterns of cellphone use. The children ranged in age from 7 to 19, and researchers asked how long they had been regular users of mobile phones, which ear they tended to favor, and whether they ever used a hands-free device.

Reporting from Paris -- When he was diagnosed with a malignant brain tumor 20 years ago, David Servan-Schreiber, the French-born doctor, neuroscientist and later bestselling author, took the phrase "physician, heal thyself" to heart. Submitting to the punishing traditional treatments of chemotherapy and radiotherapy, he still felt there was something more he could do to enhance his chances of survival. FOR THE RECORD: An earlier version of this article incorrectly reported the name of David Servan-Schreiber's wife in the list of survivors and omitted two children.

Anytime the words “brain cancer” and “cellphones” show up in the same news story, a whole lot of people are going to feel jumpy the next time they hear their ringtone. And now that the World Health Organization has declared cellphones to be a “possible” cause of brain cancer, we can expect a fresh round of cellular anxiety. But before you toss your phone — or panic about those many hours already spent with a phone attached to your skull — it’s important to put the new WHO report into context.

Cellphone users may be at increased risk for two types of rare tumors and should try to reduce their exposure to the energy emitted by the phones, according to a panel of 31 international scientists convened by an agency within the World Health Organization. Studies so far do not show definitively that cellphone use increases that risk, said the authors of the consensus statement issued Tuesday by the WHO. But "limited" scientific evidence exists, they said, to suggest that the radiofrequency energy released by cellphones may increase the risk of glioma, a type of brain cancer, and acoustic neuroma, a noncancerous tumor of the nerve that runs from the ear to the brain.

Brain tumors may soon encounter a new weapon. The Food and Drug Administration has approved a new device that uses electrical energy to kill brain cancer cells. The device, approved for those who have malignant tumors known as glioblastoma multiforme, adds a potential new alternative to chemotherapy for patients with advanced brain tumors. The device, called NovoTTF, delivers low-intensity electrical fields directly to a patient’s scalp via four electrodes. The electrical fields appear to interfere with the process of cell division, halting the tumor’s growth.

Scientists will attack brain cancers by infecting tumor cells with a herpes gene and then killing the cancer with a herpes drug, under an experimental therapy approved by a federal committee Monday. The experimental therapy, proposed by medical scientists at the University of Iowa, was approved unanimously Monday by a National Institutes of Health committee. It now must be approved by the NIH director and by the Food and Drug Administration. Dr. Kenneth W.

A protein that inhibits the growth of cancer-causing stem cells and turns them into normal brain cells may become an effective therapy for deadly brain tumors, researchers have reported in the journal Nature. A team led by Angelo Vescovi of the University of Milan-Bicocca in Italy took cancer stem cells removed from people with glioblastomas, the deadliest kind of primary brain cancer, and exposed them in a laboratory dish to a protein called BMP.

Lawrence Tolliver II, a barber by trade, wasn't sure he could do it at first. But now he thinks he's ready. The tools are in his backpack, and he is preparing to travel to a funeral home on South Crenshaw Boulevard to cut the hair of his deceased son. He did it for his father back in 2004, and he has done it for close friends, paying tribute with one last cleanup, on the house. But with a son, he's feeling a different kind of pain and loss, the natural order of things undone. "I wasn't afraid with my father," Mr. Tolliver says.

Ryan Lamantia and Walter Wetzel were two very ill young boys -- one with brain cancer, the other with leukemia. One made it, one didn't. And that's where this story starts. The boys met in a hospital during their respective treatments. This Chicago Tribune story tells what happened: "He inspired me to survive my cancer," Walter, now 17, in remission and quite the football player and snowboarder, says in the story. "Seeing him happy all the time made me happy. How could I be upset if he had it so much worse than me?"