Ependymoma Brain Tumors and Asbestos Exposure: What to Know
Scientists have been exploring connections between asbestos exposure and the development of brain tumors. Further research is needed.
Researchers have definitely linked asbestos exposure with several kinds of brain cancer. However, the link between ependymoma brain tumors and asbestos exposure is unclear. These other kinds of brain tumors, such as astrocytoma and glioblastoma multiforme, are much more common than ependymoma brain tumors. Ependymoma begins in the ependymal cells. These cells line the passageways that carry cerebrospinal fluid. This fluid surrounds and protects the brain and spinal cord.
Learning More About Ependymoma Brain Tumors
Usually, ependymoma is a childhood disease. The five-year survival rate is close to 90 percent. Alarmingly, 90 percent is the death rate for most other asbestos exposure-related illnesses, such as mesothelioma. This rare and aggressive form of heart-lung cancer is difficult to diagnose and treat. A malignant tumor is concealed in the thick membranes of the mesothelium, which surrounds the heart and lungs, for decades. By the time doctors find it, the cancer is advanced. Most forms of treatment, like radiation and chemotherapy, are basically useless at this stage.
For most asbestos exposure victims and their families, the future is grim. A partnership with an asbestos exposure lawyer doesn’t turn things around. Lawyers cannot wave magic wands and make tumors disappear. But an asbestos exposure lawyer can obtain substantial compensation in court. This compensation, though it doesn’t begin to make up for what happened, brightens the future for these victims and families. At this point, any ray of light is a very welcome sight for people who live in darkness.
Various Types of Brain Tumors
Mesothelioma is one of several kinds of lung cancer. Outcomes in other lung cancer cases, most notably non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC), the most common form of this disease, are usually much better. Similarly, the brain cancer outcome often depends on the type of tumor.
Meningioma:
These tumors, which are related to meningitis infections, the most common primary brain tumor, accounting for more than 30 percent of all brain tumors. Meningiomas originate in the meninges, the outer three layers of tissue that cover and protect the brain just under the skull.
Glioma:
Glioblastomas is about as common as meningioma. These tumors, which usually arise from the glial cells that surround and support neurons, could be aggressive and deadly or benign and non-threatening.
Adenoma:
About 10 percent of brain tumors are Pituitary Adenoma. These brain tumors, which grow in the gland tissues, are the most common types of pituitary tumor. Pituitary adenomas develop from the pituitary gland and tend to grow at a slow rate.
Schwannoma:
These tumors, which are slow-growing tumors in the nerve that connects the ear to the brain, make up about 8 percent of all brain cancer cases. Acoustic neuromas (vestibular schwannomas) usually develop in middle-aged adults, grow on the nerve sheath (covering surrounding the nerve fibers), and often cause hearing loss
More common brain tumors are easier to treat, simply because experienced doctors are usually available. Many doctors have experience treating common tumors. But when it comes to rare tumors, qualified doctors are few and far between.
Asbestos isn’t directly linked to ependymoma tumors, but asbestos exposure could indirectly cause them. Asbestos spurs the production of cancer-causing free radicals. These particles extend cell life. That sounds like a good thing, but it’s not. Dying cells on their last legs cling to life. They clump together and siphon nutrients from other parts of the body.
Possible Asbestos Exposure Victims and Brain Tumors
Because of the free radical factor, if you or a loved one is in any at-risk category and developed cancer, an asbestos exposure lawyer should at least evaluate your case. You may be eligible for compensation. This compensation usually includes money for economic losses, such as medical bills, and noneconomic losses, such as pain and suffering. Additional punitive damages are usually available in these cases as well.
Direct Asbestos Exposure:
Until around 1980, asbestos, which does not conduct noise, electricity, or heat, was a common ingredient in many manufactured and construction products. Manufactured parts that must withstand high heat, like brake pads, contained asbestos. So did attic insulation, drywall, and many other construction materials.
Indirect Asbestos Exposure:
Workers who handled asbestos-laced products and/or worked in asbestos-laced facilities usually didn’t wear proper PPE (personal protective equipment), either because the company didn’t provide it or urge its workers to use it. Other workers, such as secretaries and executives, didn’t wear PPE either, even though asbestos fibers float great distances.
Ambient (Environmental):
Man-made and natural disasters spread asbestos fibers. These man-made disasters include the toxic smoke of 9/11 and the failure to keep asbestos fibers out of talcum powder. Natural disasters include fires, high winds, and, since asbestos fibers are waterproof, floods.
In human years, 1980 might seem like a million years ago. But in asbestos years, 1980 was yesterday. Mesothelioma and other asbestos-exposure diseases usually have about a fifty-year latency period.
A recent chrysotile (white) asbestos ban may reduce the number of future exposure victims, assuming the ban survives legal challenges. But government bans don’t compensate victims. Only an asbestos exposure lawyer can do that.
Your Legal Options
Due to the many faces of asbestos exposure victims, several legal options are usually available. Once again, an asbestos exposure lawyer would review your case and determine the best course of action.
Civil Claim:
Manufacturers could be liable for the aforementioned damages. For years, these companies sold dangerous products and failed to warn people about the known side-effects. Furthermore, in most states, companies are strictly liable for the damages their dangerous products cause.
No-Fault Claim:
These matters include workers’ compensation, VA disability, and Social Security disability. All three use the same principle (a dangerous substance caused serious illness). All three also provide basically the same benefits (lost wage replacement and medical bill payment).
Bankruptcy VCF Claim:
As lawsuits mounted, many asbestos providers tried to take the easy way out and filed bankruptcy. As a condition of those bankruptcies, federal judges required these companies to transfer assets into victim compensation funds, which today contain more than $30 billion.
Rules and principles vary in these claims, but most end the same way. Over 90 percent of injury claims settle out of court.
Settling a case out of court is not raising the white flag of surrender. In fact, the opposite is true. Unlike a court verdict, an out-of-court settlement is a final resolution. When defendants lose cases, they often tie things up in appeals courts for years. When defendants settle cases, they write checks.