Former president Jimmy Carter says cancer has spread to his brain - washingtonpost

Former president Jimmy Carter said that the cancer doctors discovered earlier this year on his liver has also been found on his brain. Carter, 90, said he will receive his first radiation treatment for the disease Thursday afternoon.

"I'm perfectly at ease with whatever comes," Carter said at a news conference. Carter said Thursday that doctors found "four spots of melanoma on my brain -- small spots" after first discovering cancer during an Aug. 3 operation to remove a tumor from his liver.

During that surgery, Carter said, doctors suspected that the cancer had originated in another part of his body. They later discovered the melanoma spots, about "two millimeters" in size, on his brain.

Doctors removed about one-tenth of his liver during the surgery, which he said healed quickly and left him with "minimal pain."

He will undergo four courses of radiation to treat the cancer in his brain.  Carter said doctors will continue to scan his body for cancer, in an effort to determine where the melanoma originated.
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By the end of June, doctors were certain that he would need to have an operation on his liver, Carter said. But chose to delay surgery in order to complete a book tour for his memoir published this year, "A Full Life: Reflections at Ninety."

Carter is the second-oldest living president, separated by just over 100 days in age from George H.W. Bush. Carter, the 39th president, served in the White House from 1977 to 1981.

After his presidency, he has continued his humanitarian and human rights work through the Carter Center. It was for that work that he was awarded a Nobel Peace Prize in 2002. - Read More
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• An advocate for those on the margins