Treatments for meningioma

The following are treatment options for meningioma. Your healthcare team will suggest treatments based on your needs and work with you to develop a treatment plan.

Treatment will depend on whether the tumour is causing any symptoms.

Active surveillance means that your healthcare team watches the cancer closely rather than giving treatment right away.

Active surveillance may be offered for meningioma, because many of these tumours are non-cancerous (benign) and slow growing. If you start to have symptoms, your healthcare team will talk about other treatment options.

Find out more about active surveillance.

Surgery may be offered for meningioma if the tumour is causing symptoms or if it is growing quickly.

Find out more about surgery for brain and spinal cord tumours.

Radiation therapy uses high-energy rays or particles to destroy cancer cells. Radiation therapy may be offered for meningioma if the tumour can’t be removed by surgery, or if there is still tumour remaining after surgery.

Find out more about radiation therapy for brain and spinal cord tumours.

Corticosteroids and antiseizure medicines (anticonvulsants) may be offered to help lessen the symptoms caused by meningiomas and their treatment.

Find out more about corticosteroids and antiseizure medicines.

Recurrent meningioma means that the cancer has come back after it has been treated. Your healthcare team will suggest treatments based on your needs and work with you to develop a treatment plan.

There are no standard treatments for recurrent meningioma. Treatment will depend on what treatments you had before, where the tumour has come back, and your overall health.

You may be offered the following treatments for recurrent meningioma:

• surgery
• radiation therapy
• chemotherapy
• immunotherapy

You may want to consider a type of care to make you feel better without treating the cancer itself. This may be because the cancer treatments don’t work anymore, they’re not likely to improve your condition or they may cause side effects that are hard to cope with. There may also be other reasons why you can’t have or don’t want cancer treatment.

Talk to your healthcare team. They can help you choose care and treatment for advanced cancer.

Talk to your doctor about clinical trials open to people with brain and spinal cord tumours in Canada. Clinical trials look at new ways to prevent, find and treat cancer. Find out more about clinical trials.