Rock icon Eddie Van Halen, who is living with throat cancer, celebrated the birthday of his older brother, Alex, 67, on Instagram. The two co-founded Van Halen in 1974 with David Lee Roth and Michael Anthony. Eddie Van Halen, who was originally diagnosed with throat cancer in 2000, has faced recurrences since 2002. Until now, he’d been absent from social media for weeks, while his wife, Janie Liszewski Van Halen, maintained a positive presence. Along with a puppy playdate photo of Kody Van Halen, she recently shared the message “Accept what is, let go of what was, and have faith in what will be,” on Instagram.
View this post on InstagramRead More RELATED: As Eddie Van Halen Faces His Own Cancer Journey, Wife Janie Reveals Cancer Scare of Her Own
In March, some fans may have wondered if Van Halen was welcoming a grandchild. In fact, he was celebrating another birthday, that of Wolfgang, 29 — his son with first wife, Valerie Bertinelli — also a musician, with a throwback photo (below) of his arrival into the world.Eddie Van Halen's Throat Cancer
After a previous tongue cancer diagnosis in 2000, Van Halen underwent surgery to remove the cancer along with roughly a third of his tongue. Though he was declared cancer-free in 2002, Newser reported that the singer "occasionally had cancer cells scraped out of his throat after they migrated there."
Now, sources have told the celebrity news site TMZ that Van Halen has been flying to Germany to receive radiation treatment for his throat cancer for five years.
It is unclear why Van Halen is being treated in Germany as opposed to somewhere closer to Los Angeles, where he now lives. It's worth noting that the star was born in the Netherlands (which borders Germany) and lived there until age seven, when his family moved to California. German cancer clinics have been known to draw patients from many countries in Europe and beyond.
Van Halen Theorizes About The Cause of His Cancer
Van Halen theorizes that years of putting copper and brass guitar picks in his mouth caused his throat cancer. "I used metal picksthey're brass and copperwhich I always held in my mouth, in the exact place where I got the tongue cancer," he previously told Billboard.
Dr. Jessica Geiger, a medical oncologist at Cleveland Clinic Cancer Center explains the link between HPV and cancer.
"This is just my own theory, but the doctors say it's possible."This is probably not the case, however. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) do not classify copper or the metals in brass (an alloy comprised of copper and zinc) as carcinogenic to humans. This means that there isn't known evidence that the metals cause cancer. Plus, Van Halen has been a lifelong smoker; as he told Billboard during the same interview, he began smoking cigarettes when he was only 12 years old.
"I was an alcoholic, and I needed alcohol to function… I started drinking and smoking when I was 12," Van Halen said, adding that the reason he doesn't credit his cancer to smoking is that, despite his throat cancer, his "lungs are totally clear." Smoking, however, is a known risk factor for oral cancer and throat cancer just as it is for lung cancer. Excessive consumption of alcohol use also increases cancer risk. And throat cancer is often tied to exposure to the HPV virus.
According to the American Cancer Society, "Tobacco and alcohol use are 2 of the strongest risk factors for oral cavity and oropharyngeal cancers." (Oropharyngeal cancers meaning cancers of the mouth, tongue, or throat).
What's more, "the risk of these cancers is even higher in people who both smoke and drink alcohol, with the highest risk in heavy smokers and drinkers. According to some studies, the risk of these cancers in heavy drinkers and smokers may be as much as 100 times higher than the risk in people who don't smoke or drink."
Van Halen was previously diagnosed with tongue cancer in 2000.
Treatment Options for Throat Cancer
"In early-stage throat cancer, the cancer is confined to just what we call the primary tumor in the back of the throat or the tonsils, or the base of the tongue," said Dr. Geiger. "But if the PET scan shows that the cancer has moved to the lungs or the liver, then our approach would not be to cure cancer but to treat it and to keep it under control," she says. "It's really complicated because there are three stage 4s. It's not like breast cancer where, once you're Stage 4, you're incurable," she continues.
"In more advanced throat cancer cases, which is actually the most common stage that we see," she adds, "in addition to the primary tumor, lymph nodes of the neck are involved."
"Patients who have disease that has spread outside of the head and neck region, meaning below the clavicles, into the lungs or into the liver, we call that distant metastatic disease and by definition, those patients are considered incurable," she continues, "So our efforts at treatment would be focused on palliative therapy, controlling the disease but, unfortunately, not curing it."
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