Why do medulloblastomas metastasize to other parts of the brain or spinal cord?
410695
There is a good article here regarding why cancer spreads:  http://www.healthcastle.com/cancer_general_mets.shtml\n\n Can cancer spread? How?\nThere are several ways in which cancers can spread:  \n They directly invade adjacent tissues. \n They enter the lymphatic stream and are carried to lymph nodes. \n Cancer cells pass through the blood stream to other parts of the body.  http://www.indiacancer.org/faq/\n\nLots of info about medulloblastomas here:  http://www.emedicine.com/neuro/topic624.htm\n\nCells from an intracranial growth (e.g. medulloblastoma) may be seeded into the CSF and form deposits on other brain surfaces or in the spinal canal.  http://www.kfshrc.edu.sa/Radtherapy/html/spreading.html
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The tumors of lung cancer can grow and replace normal lung tissue which can greatly affect a person's ability to breathe normally.  They may tire more quickly, lowering the exercise tolerance.  \n\nIf there is tumor in the lung, it is often a sign that there is tumor elsewhere in the body, since the lungs are at the front and center of the circulatory system, which can spread cancer cells.  Disseminated cancer can cause a person to lose weight feel perpetually weak, in addition to the specific damage it may do to individual organs.
557487
They come from the stem of the brain.
1118891
Yes it can spread or "metastasize".  One of my first cousins recently died of it.  He was in his early 50's and by the time he died the cancer had spread to his bones, [mainly his spine] as well as to his brain.    Anytime it spreads to the bones you can expect significant pain.\n\nIf you are interesting in learning more, http://www.lungcanceronline.org/\n\nhas lots of info.
550463
It is the hub.  Just about everything passes through it.  To really find out some of the things the cerebellum does look up medical papers that discuss what has happened to people who have had to have parts of the cerebellum removed due to brain tumors, injury, etc.  \nFor example my father had parts of his removed and now he has serious difficulties with balance, coordination, no short term memory, trouble recalling vocabulary to sufficiently express himself.....There are many more "little" things I could add.
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There is nothing to prevent it, because they do not know what causes it.  A theory is we are all born with cancer cells, but something triggers them to grow.  Researchers are working hard to find the answers.  Example:  My nephew 12 months old goes to his pediatrician for his one year check up- the baby was breast feed and only introduced to foods within the last three months.  Md notices lump in abdomen-sends my sister to hospital the next day for ultrasound.  Diagnosis Wilm's tumor, a very rapid growing tumor inside the kidney that has to be removed and treated with Chemo for a year.  How do you explain children with cancer, they haven't even begone life and they have to fight for it.  Cancer is a mystery and they need money for research.  My sisters sons MD are looking into our water supplies.  You can try a healthy lifestyle, but the air you breath is polluted, water, etc. only our Maker knows the answers.
1017957
read here \n\nhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metastasis\n\nthe process is called metastasis
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It appears that you have a cranial tumor.  The phrase "the mass" is the clue for the layperson.  Ask you doctor right away and/or call the physician that wrote the report.  Get answers as to the diagnosis and treatment alternatives.  Most cranial tumors are astrocytoma but there are a few that are benign.  All tumors of this area need treatment.  Radiation is usually the modality that can help shrink the lesion, benign or malignant.  Good luck
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I am not a doctor (just been around them alot lately) so I'm not entirely sure. But, my son had stage IV intra-abdominal sarcoma so I'm familiar with some of the words here.\n\nI would suspect that this refers to metastatic spred (tumor implants or seeding) into the abdominal cavity. (the omentum appears hardened indicating 'seeding' of tiny nodules or tumors).\n\nYou should ask your oncologist though.\n\nStay strong.
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There are different types of tumour, some agressive and some very slow growing.  \nIf you are worried that you have cancer go and get checked out by a doctor!  Stuumbling and losing grip on things can be due to other reasons, all of which need looking at by a professional...;
948804
Generally, when cancer cells leave the original site to go to another place in the body, it's called metastasis.
1033993
might have a brain tumor
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It totally depends on the type of cancer.  Some bone cancer is metastatic -- it came from somewhere else in the body.  Other bone tumors are primary.  There is a long list of types -- osteosarcoma, Ewing's sarcoma, mutliple myeloma, and the metastatic tumors.  Try to find out the pathological classification of the cancer from you medical records or physician, and then try a web search for a litany of information about the specific type.
135235
cancer that goes from one body part to another
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My husband had a pilocytic astrocytoma in his cerabellum around his brain stem 8 years ago.  It was surgically removed and required no further treatments other than a somewhat lengthy recovery from the surgery (6 months)and regular monitoring via MRI.\n\nI think the treatment would depend on the location of the tumor and the cell type.
145324
The brain tissue surrounding the ventricles is far from homogeneous, but can be separated into a number of connected but distinct parts. It is dominated by the massive cerebrum, or forebrain, divided neatly down its mid-line into two almost mirror-image halves, linked by a massive band of nerves, the corpus callosum. Below the cerebral hemispheres lie the mid- and hind-brains. For the first 3-4 mm below the wrinkled surface of the cerebrum the tissue is coloured pinkish grey, forming the cortex (meaning “bark”); below that, it is yellowish white. The colour of the cortex is due to its extremely rich blood supply—fully 20 per cent of circulating blood goes to supply the brain. By contrast the “white matter” is so because of the fatty sheaths, composed largely of myelin, which insulate the nerves packed inside. The geography of the cerebral cortex, defined by its ridges and clefts (sulci and gyri) provides a distinction between left and right, frontal and occipital lobes. The regions towards the mid-line are medial, towards the sides temporal, the top, dorsal, and the bottom, ventral.\n\nBehind the cerebrum lies the even more wrinkled and folded cerebellum (“little brain”) covered with its own cortex. Visible as the brain is dissected are a number of distinct structures named by the anatomists after their fancied resemblance to other natural forms—the hippocampus (seahorse), amygdala (almond), pons (bridge), medulla, and many more. Running down from the medulla and through the spine is the spinal cord, carrying nerves to (afferent) and from (efferent) the brain itself. Nerves to and from the eyes (optic), nose (olfactory), and also cranial nerves to other regions of the head run directly into the brain, not via the spinal cord. Together, brain and spinal cord form the central nervous system (CNS), to distinguish them from the nerves that connect the brain and cord with the rest of the body, called the peripheral nervous system. Because of the bilateral symmetry of the brain, each of the structures within it seemed to the early anatomists to be duplicated, one to the left and one to the right. The exception seemed to be the pineal gland, located in the centre of the brain, and it was in part because of this that Descartes, whose dualist philosophy firmly separated the human soul from the mere clockwork processes that ran the rest of the body, decided that the pineal must be the site at which the soul or mind interacted with and drove the body forward. Non-human animals, which were believed not to possess souls, he saw as entirely machine-like.\nThe current view of the brain is of an organ composed of a large number of substructures, each densely packed with neurons and their surrounding glia. Within each nucleus, and within the cerebral and cerebellar cortices, neurons are of three general types: some receive inputs from either sense organs or other brain regions; others (projection or pyramidal neurons) transmit signals out of the region, down long axons to other brain regions or, via the spinal cord or cranial nerves to the periphery. The third and much the most numerous class are the spiny or stellate interneurons, which communicate only within a particular nucleus or cortex, either with one another or with the afferent and efferent neurons.\n\nFor modern localizers, these different substructures are regarded as “centres” for particular brain functions. Of particular importance are a group of connected nuclei including the hypothalamus, hippocampus, some nuclei of the thalamus, and the amygdala, sometimes grouped together as the limbic system. These centres are particularly relevant in the context of emotion, sexual drive, hunger, and thirst, and damage to them can have profound effects. The hypothalamus also has direct neural connections with the pituitary gland at the base of the brain, the source for many important regulatory hormones, and hypothalamic-pituitary feedback processes provide a key site for
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Your brain is divided into six major divisions:  the cerebrum, the diencephalon (where the hypothalamus is located), the mid brain, the cerebellum, the pons and the medulla oblongata.  \n\nThe hypothalamus is the center for homeostasis and controls things like hunger, thirst, maintaining body temperature and the control of some reproductive system functions.\n\nThe medulla oblongata is where the spinal cord transitions into the brain.  It is part of the brain stem.  It's job is the control of non-voluntary functions and it also brings sensory information into the brain and helps the cerebral cortex relay information to the spinal cord.\n\nHope this helps...