Mark’s deadly cancer will come back. Now scientists know why
When Mark Norris finished his cancer treatment, there was nothing that doctors could do except wait for it to return. The father of two says that’s not good enough.
Mark’s deadly cancer will come back. Now scientists know why
On the bad days, Millie, a 14-year-old border collie, lies faithfully by Mark Norris’ bed.
Norris, 52, was leaving a medical appointment in January when he lost all spatial awareness. He couldn’t grab the handle of the car door and, once inside, kept shutting the door on his leg. His wife rushed him to hospital, where an MRI found a massive tumour – the size of two mandarins – pushing his brain to one side.
Mark Norris at home in Melbourne with his 14-year-old border collie, Millie. Credit: Simon Schluter
“They basically put me into surgery within hours, and … I wasn’t expected to survive the operation,” Norris said. “When you’re saying goodbye to your beautiful wife, and two boys as well, that’s pretty hard.”
Norris, from Melbourne, lived. But after six months of intense radiation and chemotherapy, he has finished his treatment for glioblastoma. There’s nothing more doctors can do except wait for the cancer to return.
“To have no options and to know that it’s going to come back, and to have no timeframe around that, it just destroys your family,” he said. “It just destroys you.”
Now, University of Sydney scientists have discovered the genetic mechanism behind how glioblastoma dodges chemotherapy to return in almost all cases, paving the way for research into potential new treatments.
Mark Norris, an executive at the company that owns Petbarn, was given less than 12 months to live when he was diagnosed with glioblastoma in January.Credit: Simon Schluter
The research, published in Nature Communications this month, found a small population of drug-resistant “persister cells” within tumours that lie dormant during chemotherapy, and then proliferate once the therapy is finished.
The researchers found the growth of these cells was fuelled by a fertility gene called PRDM9. The gene is normally restricted to regulating changes in the chromosomes but can be hijacked by glioblastoma cells to act as a tap that provides the cholesterol needed for these cells to survive.