What is Brain Cancer?

There are more than 40 major types of brain tumours, which are grouped into two main types: benign and malignant. Benign tumours are slow growing and unlikely to spread. Malignant tumours are cancerous and able to spread into other parts of the brain or spinal cord.

Every year, about 1200 Australians die of brain cancer. This is a staggering one person every eight hours. Brain cancer often affects younger adults, in the prime of their lives, and is now the biggest cancer killer of children. With surgery, chemotherapy and radiotherapy, about a quarter of patients survive two years and one in 10 survives five years. In comparison, 95 per cent of patients with breast cancer survive five years.