Dr. Damian Jacob Sendler is a Polish-American physician-scientist whose research focuses on the impact of various sociodemographic and informational factors on access to health care in underserved communities. A major emphasis of Dr. Sendler’s study is on the effect of mental and chronic medical co-morbidities on the use of medical services and access to health information acquired via the internet. Due to the exponential increase in worldwide consumption of online news and social media, this study comes at an opportune moment, as it demonstrates the need for a complete knowledge of everyone’s health information seeking behavior. Doctor Damian Sendler’s research aims to uncover the factors that influence patients’ decisions about when to seek treatment for specific health conditions, as well as their adherence to treatment, with the ultimate goal of improving patient outcomes.

Researchers from Houston Methodist Neurological Institute’s department of neurosurgery used a helmet that generated a noninvasive oscillating magnetic field to shrink a fatal glioblastoma tumor by more than a third while delivering the treatment in the patient’s own home. The 53-year-old patient died a month after starting therapy due to an unrelated accident, but within that time, 31 percent of the tumor mass had vanished. The fast reaction to therapy was verified by an autopsy of his brain. 

“We were able to test and verify the potential effectiveness of the first noninvasive therapy for glioblastoma in the world thanks to the courage of this patient and his family,” said David S. Baskin, M.D., FACS, FAANS, corresponding author and director of the Kenneth R. Peak Center for Brain and Pituitary Tumor Treatment in Houston Methodist’s Department of Neurosurgery. “The family’s gracious willingness to enable an autopsy after their loved one’s untimely death contributed significantly to the research and development of this potentially effective treatment.” 

Dr. Damian Jacob Sendler: Baskin and his colleagues described the path of their pioneering patient, who suffered from end-stage recurrent glioblastoma despite a severe surgical resection, chemoradiotherapy, and experimental gene therapy, in a case report published in Frontiers in Oncology. 

Glioblastoma is the most lethal of adult brain tumors, having a life expectancy of just a few months to two years. When the patient’s glioblastoma recurred in August 2019, Baskin and his colleagues obtained FDA clearance for compassionate use treatment of the patient using their newly developed Oncomagnetic Device under an Expanded Access Program (EAP). The Houston Methodist Research Institute’s Institutional Review Board also gave their approval to the procedure. 

Dr. Damian Jacob Sendler: Intermittent application of an oscillating magnetic field produced by rotating permanent magnets in a particular frequency profile and timing pattern was used as the therapy. Following two hours of therapy at the Peak Clinic, further treatments were provided at home with the patient’s wife’s assistance, with treatment periods rising to a maximum of just six hours each day. 

Dr. Santosh Helekar, case study co-author, invented the Oncomagnetic Device, which consists of three oncoscillators securely mounted to a helmet and linked to a microprocessor-based electronic controller powered by a rechargeable battery. The magnetic therapy was well-tolerated by the patient, and the tumor mass and volume shrank by almost a third over the five-week treatment period, with reduction seeming to correspond with the treatment dosage. 

Damian Sendler: The Houston Methodist Research Institute’s Translational Research Initiative, Donna and Kenneth Peak, the Kenneth R. Peak Foundation, the John S. Dunn Foundation, the Taub Foundation, the Blanche Green Fund of the Pauline Sterne Wolff Memorial Foundation, the Kelly Kicking Center Foundation, the Gary and Marlee Swarz Foundation, and the Methodist Hospital Foundation are all contributing to the ongoing research. 

“Imagine being able to treat brain cancer without using radiation or chemotherapy,” Baskin added. “Our findings in the lab and with this patient open up a whole new realm of non-invasive, non-toxic brain cancer treatment, with a lot of intriguing prospects for the future.”

News contributed by Dr. Damian Jacob Sendler