Ted Kennedy survives successful brain operation
June 3, 2008
Anne Blythe - McClatchy NewspapersIssue date: 5/29/08 Section: Real News
DURHAM, N.C. _ Dr. Allan Friedman, the neurosurgeon who spent three-and-a-half hours on Monday successfully extracting a fast-growing tumor from the brain of Sen. Edward Kennedy, has a reputation among his peers as being high-strung inside the operating room.
Outside, away from the scalpels, clamps and whirring bone drills, the co-director of Duke University's Preston Robert Tisch Brain Tumor Center comes across as low-key and humble, his colleagues say.
As half a dozen media crews waited in tents and satellite trucks outside Duke Hospital for news on the Massachusetts senator, Duke, typically a trumpeter of its people and research, remained hushed about its famous patient and his doctor.
Shortly after 2 p.m., the family issued a statement from Friedman, describing the surgery as a success. During a procedure in which Kennedy was awake, Friedman sliced the malignant glioma, or fast-growing tumor, from Kennedy's left parietal lobe, which controls the ability to speak and understand language as well as sensation and movement to the right side of the body.
"Senator Kennedy was awake during the resection, and should therefore experience no permanent neurological affects from the surgery," Friedman reported in his statement.
Neurosurgeons familiar with such tumors say Kennedy was probably shown pictures of objects, such as footballs and other ordinary things, or asked to count throughout the surgery. The senator's inability to respond to such simple cues would indicate to the surgeon he was close to a crucial brain tissue.
"People do amazingly well with awakeness surgery," said Stephen Tatter, co-director of the Gamma Knife Radiosurgery Center and a neurosurgeon at Wake Forest University School of Medicine. "There's no feeling in the brain itself."
During a week of recuperation at Duke, doctors are likely to watch for complications from swelling that could cause motor-skill problems. Afterward, Kennedy, 76, will begin targeted radiation at Massachusetts General and chemotherapy treatment.
Outside, away from the scalpels, clamps and whirring bone drills, the co-director of Duke University's Preston Robert Tisch Brain Tumor Center comes across as low-key and humble, his colleagues say.
As half a dozen media crews waited in tents and satellite trucks outside Duke Hospital for news on the Massachusetts senator, Duke, typically a trumpeter of its people and research, remained hushed about its famous patient and his doctor.
Shortly after 2 p.m., the family issued a statement from Friedman, describing the surgery as a success. During a procedure in which Kennedy was awake, Friedman sliced the malignant glioma, or fast-growing tumor, from Kennedy's left parietal lobe, which controls the ability to speak and understand language as well as sensation and movement to the right side of the body.
"Senator Kennedy was awake during the resection, and should therefore experience no permanent neurological affects from the surgery," Friedman reported in his statement.
Neurosurgeons familiar with such tumors say Kennedy was probably shown pictures of objects, such as footballs and other ordinary things, or asked to count throughout the surgery. The senator's inability to respond to such simple cues would indicate to the surgeon he was close to a crucial brain tissue.
"People do amazingly well with awakeness surgery," said Stephen Tatter, co-director of the Gamma Knife Radiosurgery Center and a neurosurgeon at Wake Forest University School of Medicine. "There's no feeling in the brain itself."
During a week of recuperation at Duke, doctors are likely to watch for complications from swelling that could cause motor-skill problems. Afterward, Kennedy, 76, will begin targeted radiation at Massachusetts General and chemotherapy treatment.
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