A seizure was Barbara Gray's distress call in 1996, when she was at work. I felt so out of control and so scared. Gray is among the more than 40,000 people in the United States diagnosed with a brain tumor annually. Of those, more than 17,000 have primary brain tumors, which begin in the brain. Most primary brain tumors occur in adults.
Genetic abnormalities are the culprit in a small number, but most tumors have no known cause.
Many brain tumor specialists say that benign tumors are really just the earliest, slowest-growing stages of malignancy. Fortunately, most people with benign tumors survive after the tumor is removed. Usually, benign tumors do not come back.