PRINCIPLES OF TREATMENT OF MALIGNANT GLIOMAS IN ADULTS - AN OVERVIEW

The cornerstone of conventional treatments of malignant gliomas in adu lts has been surgical debulking, radiation therapy and chemotherapy, A lmost always a combination of these treatments is used, With these con ventional treatments the outcome, as measured by survival and quality of life, has remained universally dismal, Novel treatments, which are at different stages of laboratory and clinical trials, may offer a ray of hope for treatment of malignant gliomas, Development of these meth ods are directly related to the discoveries, over the past two decades , of cellular and molecular mechanisms involved in the genesis of brai n tumors, Understanding of the mechanisms of tumor genesis may open ne w avenues of effective treatments for this devastating cancer.