Michael Bolton explained why doctors never gave him a prognosis after his diagnosis with the glioblastoma.
For the UNversed, the 72-year-old American singer-songwriter received a diagnosis of glioblastoma, an aggressive form of brain cancer in December 2023.
While giving an interview to PEOPLE Magazine with his daughters since his diagnosis, Michael revealed that he had not received a prognosis, but they are trying to stay full of hope.
His daughter Holly Bolton said, “Our doctor told us that he had patients with glioblastoma he has been having for 10 years. In my mind, it’s my father. “
The winner of a Grammy finished chemotherapy and radiotherapy treatments in October from last year and is now in a “surviving” stage.
According to his doctors, the path after treatment is a question of surveillance, as the recurrence rate is 90%.
Now, Bolton’s MRI is carried out every two months to make sure that its tumor does not come back and affects it silently and the last scan, which was taken in April, has shown no sign of tumor.
In particular, according to the glioblastoma foundation, the statistics of patients with glioblastoma are intimidating, because the rate of survival at five years is only 6.9%.
However, Holly was sitting that her father’s deadly disease is the “best scenario” because the doctors found it early enough, the tumor was completely removed and he has a gene that makes chemotherapy more likely to work.
Bolton’s neuro-oncologist, Dr. Ingo Mellinghoff of the Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in New York, spoke with the same survival point.
He explained: “We continue to monitor the recurrence of tumors. This does not mean that they are cured, necessarily … it is a change of mentality. Hope is one of the strongest therapies we have. ”
Mellinghoff said he hoped that new treatments for glioblastoma will be found soon and that is why try not to use the word “incurable”.
He shared: “We really hope to progress in clinical trials. I think it’s the only way to progress. I have been in this area for over 20 years, and we have really transformed the treatment of cancer. ”
“The treatments we use for melanoma are completely different from 20 years ago 20 years ago. I think that a certain degree of humility is in order because we do not know what new treatments against cancer we have, “said Mellinghoff.
