BOSTON – The seizure suffered Saturday by U.S. Sen. Edward M. Kennedy was caused by a cancerous tumor in the parietal lobe of his brain, doctors said today, according to the Associated Press.
Kennedy, 76, fell ill at his home on Cape Cod, and was flown to Boston for admission to Massachusetts General Hospital.
“He has had no further seizures, remains in good overall condition and is up and walking around,” Dr. Lee Schwamm, vice chairman of the Department of Neurology at Mass General, and Dr. Larry Ronan, Kennedy’s primary care physician, said in their joint statement today. The senator will remain in the hospital “for the next couple of days, according to routine protocol,” they added.
Tests conducted at the hospital reportedly indicate the seizure was caused by a malignant glioma. Average survival times range from less than a year for particularly aggressive varieties, such as glioblastomas, up to about five years for slower-growing varieties. Treatment usually includes both radiation and chemotherapy.
As of 2 p.m., Kennedy’s official congressional Web site, kennedy.senate.gov, still had no mention of the tumor. It described the Massachusetts Democrat as “resting comfortably after experiencing a seizure Saturday morning,” The site also offered a box for constituents and others to fill in, “if you would like to send your best wishes.”
The senator is a longtime leader in the fight against cancer.
“In 1971 … we passed the National Cancer Act – with broad bipartisan support – and launched the War on Cancer,” Kennedy noted in his comments at a May 8 hearing before the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee.
“Since then, significant progress has been made. … Cancer is no longer the automatic death sentence that it was a generation ago,” he said. “But despite impressive achievements in fighting cancer, our society now faces a perfect storm of conditions [that] have expanded the number of our citizens suffering from cancer: the aging of our population, new environmental issues, increased life expectancy and unhealthy behavior. As a result, today cancer is still the second highest cause of death in America.
“Clearly, we need a new way forward in battling this frightening disease. We must build on what the nation has already accomplished, and launch a new war on cancer for the 21st century.”
Additional information, including U.S. Sen. Edward M. Kennedy’s full May 8 statement, is available from his office at kennedy.senate.gov/newsroom. Information about the senator’s career and the Kennedy family – including his son U.S. Rep. Patrick J. Kennedy, D-R.I. – is available at kennedy.senate.gov/senator.
