When you or a loved one is diagnosed with brain cancer, especially an aggressive one like Glioblastoma, one of the first questions that run through your mind is about glioblastoma life expectancy.
Given that my husband, Kraston, was a strong, otherwise healthy, young 33 year old man when he was diagnosed, his doctors did not give us a ‘prognosis’ or life expectancy. So being the curious researcher that I am, I set out to review all of the statistics available to determine what we should expect.
Life Expectancy Without Treatment
Without treatment of any kind, the typical glioblastoma life expectancy is generally accepted to be around 3 months. This is generally for people who have inoperable tumors and are too sick to undergo radiation or chemo. Luckily, Kraston’s tumor was operable and he was healthy and strong enough that he had few side effects from radiation or chemo.
Life Expectancy with Treatment
Life expectancy with for a cancer patient seems to be defined as “median survival time since diagnosis”, or the amount of time that 50% of patients survive after diagnosis. Median survival time is usually measured in months for glioblastoma.
Another way many resources measure life expectancy is as a percentage of people who live to an indicated number of years.
The number of months of survival time varies somewhat depending on how old the data is. Many websites still state a life expectancy of 12-15 months, but median survival time seems to have improved over the last ten years.
The following are the most current statistics that I have found:
Data from UCLA Neuro-Oncology
- Age range 18-34: 36.5 months.
- Age range 36-50: 20.8 months.
- Age range 50-70: 19.7 months.
- Age range 70-93: 16.2 months.
- Total Age range 18-93: 20.1 months
Source: How Our Patients Perform : Glioblastoma Multiforme [GBM]
Data From November 2016 Stupp Presentation
- Standard Protocol: 19.8 months.
- Standard Protocol + Optune: 24.5 months
Source: SNO 2016 Clinical Highlights
Data From American Brain Tumor Association
- 30% survival at 2 years.
- Almost 10% survival at 5 years.
Source: Glioblastoma (GBM)
Glioblastoma Life Expectancy
It has been 8 months today since Kraston was diagnosed. As noted above, he hasn’t been given any specific prognosis. He had a stable (unchanged) MRI last week and is currently feeling good. So we will keep trucking along until something changes.
Statistically 99% of glioblastoma patients have a recurrence (aka progression, aka starts growing again and causing symptoms). I’ll probably do an analysis of the statistics for “progression free” time soon, but initial information from the indicates an average of 7 months progression free time since completion of radiation.
We are coming up on 6 months since radiation, so my prayer is that his tumor will wait as long as possible before it starts to grow again.
My sister Chere (in Albuquerque) discovered this and sent to our siblings. I am Cathy Martin and I live here in Tulsa. I am very pleased to hear the Kraston is doing well and admire your investigation and ability to hold on to hope and love for your lovely family.
We pray for complete healing.
Love,
Another Colby relative
Thanks for your comment, Cathy. Unfortunately Kraston wasn’t doing as well as we had hoped after his second surgery. You can read my mini-update here.
I just found out that I just received the Glioblastoma and wanted to keep connecting with people with similar situations.
This information is 3 years old. Is there any newer information on the above information life expectancy?
Hi, Chris,
Unfortunately I am not updating this site at this time. My husband Kraston passed away 11 months after diagnosis. He had a second surgery and the incision got infected. His death certificate states both meningitis and brain cancer as cause of death. So I haven’t been researching life expectancy anymore. I will pray for you with your diagnosis. I hope you find good doctors. Definitely look into trials as the standard treatments don’t seem to offer much hope.
I have a friend who is dying from this type of tumer. Very sad way to die.
I’m so sorry , I can’t imagine your pain ,,I was diagnosed with GLB in June any and all suggestions are welcome with open arms, But God bless you and thank you for this page in the comments
my best friend’s son was diagnosed August he is an 19 year old boy. I’m Sorry for your loss Amanda. I was wondering though it is very uncommon for an 18 year old to have this so every thing they have been telling us is: your young and strong we are just hopeful.
in all your research did you ever find anything helpful.
He can’t do Optune it would burn holes and leave sores.
Has anyone found anything to give us hope? He just completed his 2nd round of Chemo, it was a double dose. he’s not doing to well and right now we can’t if it’s from the chemo or the aggressive tumors.
My name is Lorne Burke i collapsed December 31 2022 the ambulance attendants thought i had a stroke i was was taken to Hamilton Stroke ward after a CT and MRI we were told i have Glioma Stage 2 we were in shock my father mother and sister all recently died from brain cancer it seems unreal Dr Reddy my surgeon has told us because of the location it they cannnot do surgery i have become increasing ill my head ache has become severe surgeon says tumor is at a growing stage and to expect severe symptons i have lost control of my speach both my hands are constantly shaking i am scared and never imagined this i love life but now know life as i have known is gone enjoy every second of your life and tell all you love them please remember me
My brother aged 69 has just passed after going through 18 months of therapy and pain. The 3 months were unbearable for him. He lost alot of weight. Though he hailed from Malta he resided in Toronto , Canada
My daughter in law had brain surgery in August 2022 and has now been taken off all treatments and meds (June 8 2023) and referred to Palletive care with life to live weeks only so that is a total of 10 months with every treatment possible.
A family member (F, 41), otherwise super healty and fit, was diagnosed on Feb. 21 and passed away on March 2.
She only had two symptoms on early Feb: she had strong hadaches and felt tired/sleepy, which could be expalined by the facts that she has always suffred from migrains since she was a kid, and that she had an increase in her workload due to the absence of her work colleague.
It took her a few more days to develop a light afasia and mild episodes of amnesia, which finally induced her to seek for medical attention. Initially we thought that she was just stressed or maybe she had an ischemic episode. Her bloodwork was perfect and pristine, but the MRI and TC scan showed an octopus-shaped mass, that was too large and too deep to be removed surgically.
Right after the diagnosis her medical conditions dropped dramatically: in less than a week she lost her ability to move, articulate words, eat, swallow solid foods, her headaches became more and more painful, and she had pain all over her body.
This evil cancer killed her in a matter of a few days. She didn’t even had the time to try for radiations or any other kind of treatment.
I am so sorry for your loss. Thank you for sharing.