Alfredo Quiñones-Hinojosa, MD, an Elsevier Author and professor of neurosurgery at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, is the leader of a current study to determine if people who undergo repeated surgeries to remove glioblastomas — the most aggressive and deadliest type of brain tumors — may survive longer than those who have just a one-time operation. This study was recently published by the Journal of Neurosurgery.

Glioblastoma, the brain cancer that killed Sen. Edward Kennedy, inevitably returns after tumor-removal surgery, chemotherapy, and/or radiation.

“We are reluctant to operate on patients with brain cancer multiple times as we are afraid to incur new neurological deficits or poor wound healing, and many times we are pessimistic about the survival chances of these patients,” says Dr. Quiñones-Hinojosa. “But this study tells us that the more we operate, the longer they may survive. We should not give up on these patients.”

Read more about Dr. Quiñones-Hinojosa’s study on Science Blog.