John W. Henson, M.D.
Neuroscience Center at Massachusetts General Hospital

Massachusetts General Hospital – East
Building 149
13th Street
Charlestown, MA 02129

Telephone: 617-726-5510
Email: Henson@helix.mgh.harvard.edu

Biography
Dr. Henson received his M.D. from Loma Linda University School of Medicine, California. He obtained residency training in Neurology at Vanderbilt University Medical Center and a fellowship in Neuro-oncology at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center and New York Hospital-Cornell Medical Center, New York.

Research Program
Adult patients with newly detected brain tumors are frequent in a neurological practice. Once routine neuroimaging confirms a brain mass, the most important consideration is whether the lesion represents a primary or metastatic tumor. Routine gadolinium-enhanced MRI lacks sufficient specificity to permit confident clinical decision making, particularly with neurosurgical intervention. Therefore, many patients undergo extensive testing in order to search for a primary site of origin. Studies have suggested that advanced MRI techniques can significantly improve the diagnostic accuracy of routine contrast-enhanced MRI in distinguishing malignant gliomas from brain metastasis. However, these techniques have not been critically evaluated and by administering a standardized neuroimaging protocol before biopsy, we will evaluate the imaging data in those patients with gliomas. Our goal is to define a brain tumor imaging protocol that can be used to improve the management of patients with brain tumors.

Low-grade astrocytoma of the brain and spinal cord:
Although much is known about the genetic alterations in malignant gliomas, there is much less information about the genetic events of low-grade astrocytomas (LGA) within the brain. LGA represents an initial phase in tumor formation that can set the stage for anaplastic progression to glioblastoma (GB). The influence of early changes on tumor behavior has been difficult to study because of the rarity of LGA patients, compared to patients with malignant astrocytomas. We have formed a consortium of four centers in the US and Europe, collecting large samples of cerebral LGA. Gene studies are currently being performed and we have begun an analysis of astrocytomas of the human spinal cord. Due to their rarity there is almost no published data on these genetic changes and it is likely there will be differences in the genetic changes leading to astrocytoma formation in the spinal cord compared to the brain. As a way forward to new hypotheses, we will determine genome-wide changes in spinal cord astrocytomas

Publications:
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• Henson JW, Schnitker BL, Correa KM, vonDeimling A, Fassbender F, Xu H-J, Benedict WF, Yandell DW, Louis DN. The retinoblastoma gene in involved in malignant progression of astrocytomas. Ann Neurol 1994 36:714-721.

• Shafqat S, Hedley-Whyte ET, Henson JW. Age-dependent rate of anaplasticprogression in low-grade astrocytomas. Neurology 1999;52:867-9.

• Kennedy DN, O’Craven KM, Ticho BS, Goldstein AM, Makris N, Henson JW. Structural and functional brain asymmetries in human situs inversus. Neurology 1999;53:1260-1265.

• Henson JW, Thornton AF, Louis DN. PCV chemotherapy for spinal cord astrocytoma. Neurology 2000;54:518-520.

• Henson JW. Early genetic events in the formation of astrocytomas. Curr Opin Neurol 2000;13:613-617.

• Rabinov JD, Lee PL, Barker FG, Louis DN, Harsh IV GR, Cosgrove GR, Chiocca EA, Thornton AF, Loeffler JS, Henson JW, Gonzalez RG. In Vivo MRS at 3 Tesla Predicts Recurrent Glioma vs. Radiation Effects - Initial Experience. Radiology 2002;225:871-879.

• Henson JW. Spinal cord gliomas. In Curr Opin Neurol 2001; 14:679-682. Henson JW, ed.

• Lev ML, Ozsunar Y, Rasheed AA, Barest GD, Harsh GR, Fitzek MM, Chiocca EA, Rabinov JR, Csavoy AN, Hochberg FH, Rosen BR, Schaeffer PW, Henson JW, Gonzalez RG. Elevated Relative Cerebral Blood Volume in Low Grade Oligodendrogliomas: A Confounder of High Specificity Glioma Grading Using Dynamic Spin-Echo MR Susceptibility Mapping. (in press, AJNR Am J Neuroradiol).

• Henson JW, Hobbs W, Chakravarti A, Louis DN. Cellular and genetic changes in malignant gliomas following irradiation in patients requiring early reresection of progressive tumor (submitted).