‘NOT GOING TO STOP MYSELF FROM LIVING’
MASTER’S STUDENT SOLDIERS ON DESPITE BRAIN CANCER
Denis Raymond put his l ife on hold when he was diagnosed with incurable brain cancer more than four years ago.
He knew people, on average, live about a year after being diagnosed with glioblastoma, the deadly brain cancer that killed Tragically Hip frontman Gord Downie last year.
Raymond, then 26, had been planning to do a master’s degree in social work at University of Ottawa, but it didn’t seem to make sense given his diagnosis and treatment.
Four- and- a- half years later, he sees things differently. Today, at 30, Raymond is working on that degree and planning to eventually work as a counsellor helping others diagnosed with cancer.
“I am kind of assuming (the cancer) is going to come back eventually and I am accepting that. However, in the meantime I am not going to stop myself from living and from looking to the future.”
Something that might have been a factor in his relative longevity with the disease is the electronic device he wore attached to his scalp for more than two years.
The device, called Optune, made by the company Novocure, was the subject of a recently published study that has attracted attention because it demonstrated a small breakthrough in a type of cancer that has seen few.
The device creates an electric field, which disrupts cell division and is believed to disproportionately result in the death of cancer cells, slowing the progress of the brain cancer.
It is not a cure, but the study of 695 patients — including Raymond — found the average survival of patients who used the device was 20.9 months after en- tering the study, compared with 16 months for the participants who received the standard treatment of surgery, radiation and chemotherapy alone ( participants in the study are usually fitter than average and have a slightly higher survival rate than the general population).
That means the device could add months, on average, to patients’ lives, according to the research, which was published in the Journal of the American Medical Association.
Dr. Garth Nicholas, cancer specialist and researcher at The Ottawa Hospital and the University of Ottawa, said the improvement in patients using the device “is not as big as we would like to see,” but he said there is excitement around any progress. “This is a tough cancer and there are not frequently new treatments or breakthroughs.”
Nicholas led the Canadian arm of the research.
The device has been approved by the U. S. Food and Drug Administration but not yet by Health Canada for use in Canada.
Raymond, meanwhile, is among glioblastoma patients whose survival rates are well beyond average. According to the study, five per cent of patients who only received standard treatment survived five years, compared with 13 per cent of patients who received standard treatment as well as the electric-field therapy.
For the next four months he is doing a placement in Montreal with an organization that offers support for cancer patients, an area in which he feels he has unique skills to offer.
“I am finding myself in a situation where I have this new tool in the form of me surviving this cancer that I wasn’t supposed to survive. I figured I would use that tool and see what I can make of it.”