The only person in the world to receive a groundbreaking treatment for brain cancer is doing well almost 18 months later, a charity says.
Ben Trotman, 41, took part in a clinical trial using immunotherapy to tackle his glioblastoma, an invasive growth of cells in the brain that gives an average life expectancy of nine months.
The National Brain Appeal, which funded the treatment, provided a positive update on Trotman’s condition 16 months after his treatment began in November 2022.
The trial, which had to be stopped due to a lack of recruitment, involved giving glioblastoma patients immunotherapy before the current standard treatment of surgery, radiotherapy or chemotherapy.
Trotman, who was diagnosed with glioblastoma in October 2022 before his wedding, responded poorly to treatment for the process that landed him in hospital before returning home in December that year.
Brain scans last summer and more recently showed no evidence of serious disease in his tumor, which he was told was “unheard of” in his treatment phase.
He started standard treatment last January and now continues monthly chemotherapy.
Trotman, an investment banker for JP Morgan from West Sussex, said: “We obviously don’t know what the future holds, but after having immunotherapy treatment and getting these encouraging scan results, Emily and I have gained a little hope.”
The trial was led by Dr Paul Mulholland, a brain cancer specialist at University College Hospital in London.
Mulholland said: “Ben’s response to immunotherapy was very unusual. We think this was a rapid immune response in the tumor.”
Glioblastoma is the most common type of brain tumor, affecting 3,200 people in Britain every year.
The disease killed former Labor minister Dame Tessa Jowell, 70, in 2018, as well as singer Tom Parker, 33, of boy band The Wanted in 2022.
A campaign to stop “failing” brain cancer patients from the NHS was announced in parliament last week.
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Trotman’s wife, Emily, said the treatment was “a stroke of luck in an otherwise devastating situation.”
She added: “We were struggling with the fact that Ben had gone from seemingly completely healthy to being in a situation where he had months to live. If we hadn’t met Dr. Mulholland, that would have been it for us.”
The National Brain Appeal recently awarded a grant to Mulholland and the UCL Glioblastoma Research Group to fund the work of senior computational biologist Dr Ben Kinnersley.
Mulholland added: “Our goal is to quickly achieve better outcomes for patients with glioblastoma.
“We bring together the best science, with a multidisciplinary team of clinicians, experimental scientists and bioinformaticians in which Dr Ben Kinnersley, with his unique skills, plays a vital role.”