The IBTA’s monthly e-News has been released and has emailed to all subscribers. Emailed to thousands of people around the globe, including clinicians, patients, caregivers, researchers, key opinion leaders, allied healthcare professionals, representatives of industry, academia and others, it gives a round-up of the latest research and treatment developments, news about brain tumour patient organisations around the world, and key forthcoming neuro-oncology scientific and patient conferences. You can sign up to receive the monthly e-News by registering here.
This month’s highlights
You can read the IBTA e-News January/February 2025 edition in full online here.
Some highlights from this month’s round-up:
- A group of 28 leading patient advocates have co-authored a review on the met and unmet needs of brain tumour patients in their areas of the world. The review has been published in Neuro-Oncology Practice. The co-authors explain that their paper “lays the groundwork for establishing an international baseline of patient advocacy activity and raising awareness of the vital requirement for more attention to the met and unmet needs of brain tumour patients and caregivers.”
- A paper published in BMJ Open about Covid-19 and newly diagnosed paediatric brain tumour patients in the UK has revealed stories of children undergoing treatment between January 2022 and June 2023. The study involved interviews of children and young people, their parents and caregivers, as well as healthcare professionals and charities.
- A study published in Nature reveals the discovery of a new type of stem cell in the brain which could potentially lead to better treatments for adults diagnosed with glioblastoma.
- The U-R-Immune Glioma international trial (NCT06519682) is testing an immune therapy for children and young adults with high-grade glioma. This is an early-stage study investigating the use of nivolumab in patients aged one to 25 years with high-grade gliomas that have specific DNA mutations.
- A group of researchers led by paediatric neuro-oncologist Daniel Moreira (St Jude Children’s Research Hospital) has developed PANORAMA, a clinical assessment tool that helps doctors to pinpoint and address barriers which limit cancer care quality for paediatric brain tumour patients. The aim of the tool (originally developed for use in low- and middle-income countries but also recognised to have a much wider application) is to improve the standard of care for this patient population. Read more.
- Researchers have developed an artificial intelligence (AI) model to detect the spread of metastatic brain cancer using MRI scans, offering insights into patients’ cancer without aggressive surgery. The proof-of-concept study, co-led by McGill University researchers Dr. Matthew Dankner and Dr. Reza Forghani, alongside an international team of clinicians and scientists, demonstrated that the AI model can detect the presence of cancer cells in surrounding brain tissue with 85 percent accuracy.
- A study has been published in Neuro-Oncology reporting on a phase II trial of brain MRI surveillance in people with stage IV breast cancer. The study found that asymptomatic brain metastasis is more common in this stage of breast cancer than previously understood. Researchers examined 101 asymptomatic patients diagnosed with stage 4 breast cancer, including triple-negative, HER2-positive and hormone receptor-positive/HER2-negative breast cancer.
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