When Shannen Doherty bumped her head after a Christmas party, her doctor wanted to check for a brain injury. Instead, they discovered that Shannen had brain metastases. Her stage 4 breast cancer, which she was diagnosed with in 2019 (she was first diagnosed with breast cancer in 2015 and went into remission before the cancer returned), had spread to her brain. On her podcast, Let’s Be Clear, she told the story alongside her oncologist Dr. Lawrence Piro.
“The funny story behind this is that I kind of bumped my head after a Christmas party," Shannen explained.
"I called you and was like, ‘Hey, you know over the holidays I kind of hit my head pretty badly and I know that it was bleeding,'" she continued, speaking to Dr. Piro. Dr. Piro ordered a CT scan to check for a brain injury. Instead, the CT scan found that the cancer had spread to her brain, even though she didn't seem to have symptoms.
“You weren’t exhibiting any signs of trouble. You weren’t paralyzed. You weren’t having seizures,” Dr. Piro said.
In January 2023, she had surgery. She also underwent radiation. In June, she shared a video on Instagram that showed her before the January surgery.
"I had a tumor in my head they wanted to remove and also biopsy. I am clearly trying to be brave but I am petrified," she wrote at the time. "The fear was overwhelming to me. Scared of all possible bad outcomes, worried about leaving my mom and how that would impact her. Worried that I would come out of surgery not me anymore. This is what cancer can look like."
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When speaking on the podcast with Dr. Piro, Shannen shared that she hopes that "more options" in the future can help her live a longer life.
"I always talk about the fact that we just need to squeeze out another three to five years, and then there’s going to be T-cell therapy or there’s going to be this, or there's going to be that,” she said. "Whatever it is, there’s going to be a lot more options that will give [us] another five years. Then in those five years, there’s a whole other group of options, and eventually there’s going to be a cure.”
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