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The Spokesman-Review Newspaper
Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

Kennedy undergoes brain surgery

Rob Stein and Paul Kane Washington Post

Sen. Edward M. Kennedy was recovering Monday night after undergoing brain surgery to remove a malignant tumor, a risky and delicate procedure that offers the 76-year-old Democratic icon the best chance of extending his survival.

After spending a night in intensive care and then about a week at the hospital, Kennedy plans to return to his home state to undergo the next stage of his treatment: chemotherapy and radiation at Massachusetts General Hospital.

“I feel like a million bucks. I think I’ll do that again tomorrow,” Kennedy quipped to his wife, Victoria, after the 3 1/2-hour surgery, said Stephanie Cutter, a family spokeswoman.

The surgery was “successful and accomplished our goals,” neurosurgeon Allan H. Friedman, who performed the operation at Duke University Medical Center in Durham, N.C., said in a statement.

Kennedy was partly anesthetized but awake through most the procedure as surgeons monitored his responses to ensure that no crucial brain tissue was removed, and Friedman said he should “experience no permanent neurological effects from the surgery.”

No additional details were released about the senator’s treatment, condition or prognosis. But experts who were not involved in his care said the decision to undergo surgery indicated that he and his doctors had opted for the most aggressive treatment, and that the surgeons thought they could safely remove a significant proportion of the tumor.

“It’s a sign that there’s hope that something could be done,” said John H. Sampson, a neurosurgeon who works with Friedman. “It almost certainly won’t be curative, but it should enhance the chances that additional treatment will be effective.”

A successful surgery would be the removal of at least 90 percent of the tumor without major neurological damage, several experts said.

“If you are going to operate, you have to get 90 or 95 percent; otherwise you haven’t made a difference in terms of survival,” said Vivek Deshmukh, director of cerebrovascular and endovascular neurosurgery at George Washington University Medical Center.

Even after successful surgery and follow-up radiation and chemotherapy, Kennedy’s prognosis remains fairly grim, experts said. Most patients with his type of tumor do not survive more than a year or two after diagnosis.

“If you didn’t do the surgery, you’re looking at a much shorter survival period – on the order of a matter of months,” Deshmukh said. “If you can go from three to six months of survival to a year or a year and a half, I think that’s making a difference, particularly if he’s not injured from it.”

Others noted that some people with similar tumors have survived for years.

“Every patient is different. We have a bunch of new treatments that are looking pretty good,” said Matthew G. Ewend, chief of neurosurgery at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. “You just have to keep fighting year by year.”

Kennedy found out last month that he has a malignant glioma, a common and often lethal brain tumor, after having a seizure May 17 at his home in Hyannis Port, Mass., on Cape Cod. The tumor is in a part of his brain known as the left parietal lobe, which is involved in aspects of speech, sensation and motor control.

The decision to operate was made on Friday, after a meeting in Boston of experts from around the country, said Anthony Coley, a Kennedy aide.