Removing Brain Tumors Through The Eyebrow

SANTA MONICA, Calif. (Ivanhoe Newswire) -- Headaches, dizziness, fainting, vision problems. Each year 180,000 people will experience this and be told, "You have a brain tumor." Thousands of children are among this group. Now, doctors are taking out the tumor in both young and old … without major surgery.

Little Robert Nelson knows the sounds of the ice cream truck … it can only mean one thing. He's licked a lot of the treat it the last few days.

"Ice cream every morning," 6-year-old Robert told Ivanhoe.

"When he was in the hospital he had it three times a day," his mom Krystal Nelson explained.

Robert deserves it. Less than a week before this interview, he underwent brain surgery.

A team of neuroscientists from Saint John's Health Center in Santa Monica, Calif., used a new approach to get to the tumor. They went through Robert's eyebrow.

"It's a small very focused approached that allows us to get and lets us get to where we want to go," Dan Kelley, M.D., a neurosurgeon at Saint John's health Center, explained.

Dr. Kelley makes an incision along the eyebrow, creating an opening in the bone, which allows him access to the base of skull. He went under the frontal lobe to get to the tumor near Robert's optic nerve.

"We were probably able to remove about 95 to 98 percent of the tumor," Dr. Kelley said.

Robert may still need radiation, but that's not the case for most eyebrow craniotomy patients. Compared to the more traditional surgery through the scalp or the nose, eyebrow craniotomy patients leave the hospital in two to three days following surgery. With the eyebrow approach, there is decreased risk of meningitis and leaking spinal fluids. Now, a week after having his tumor removed.

"His eye doesn't wonder any more," Krystale said. "No headaches."

Robert is headed home and it's back to reality for this little guy.

"No more breakfast ice cream," Kyrstale said.

Robert will have to undergo MRIs every three months for two years, to make sure the tumor is completely gone. Dr. Kelley says Robert has a good chance of regaining any eyesight lost because of the tumor.