Doctors at Dell Children’s Medical Center in Austin have been stunned by the unexpected recovery of an 11-year-old girl whose inoperable brain tumor miraculously disappeared.
Earlier this year, Roxli Doss was diagnosed with diffuse intrinsic pontine glioma (DIPG), a rare and extremely aggressive brain tumor with a very low survival rate. It was well-incorporated into her brain stem, making it impossible to remove surgically, so the doctors told the girld’s parents to make the most of the time they had left with her. However, they also decided to try radiation therapy, as it had been shown to extend a patient’s life by three to six months. Radiation isn’t a cure; in fact DIPG is an incurable condition , so therefore the diagnostic is considered terminal. But in Roxli’s case, the treatment literally worked wonders. After six weeks of radiation, an MRI showed almost no signs that the tumor ever existed.