Cancer Radiation for the brain- Do you really get burned from radiation on the insides???

My Grandma was just diagnosed and I am trying to learn as much as possible about this. She has non small cell cancer on her brain and on her lower left lung. She is very scared as anyone would be. She called today and she said she smells fried brains??? I didn't know what to tell her because I didn't think that radiation actually burned the insides. Can someone answer this for me, what does radiation actually do? Do you feel it can you smell it, help???

I think radiation can cook inside because I saw once at an email that scientist used the radiation of two cellular phones to cook an egg.

sweety my sis in law went thru all of this and you can burn on the inside and out i had to rub lotion on her head and face it was like a terrible sunburn---any type of cancer in the brain is very nasty so just be there for her bless your heart and try to see her alot lets pray they hurry and come up with a cure my sis in law was given 3 monthes to live and lived for 3 yrs!!there is no known cure for brain cancer----sad i know dont tell granma that we went and talked to as many people dr-s n all everywhere and there just is not but enjoy her to the max and see if she needs some lotion to relief the burn from the outside my sis in lsws was really bad --GOD BLESS ALL OF YOU IT IS A VERY TOUGH THING TO HAVE TO GO THRU i am here and wish you my best you can reach me at ladysureoneyahoo.com
if you need to talk more my best to you and yours sandy

3 years ago my husband went through this and he is about to go through it again on Monday. He is having the Gamma Knife this time because the tumor is in a really bad spot. The radiation doctor has some special lotion get it and use it alot on her. Yes it does burn your insides. She will start to have a hard time swallowing if they do radiation and chemo on her lung. Get her some Ensure to drink so that she can keep vitamins and minerals. My husband had 70 radiation treatments. 40 on his brain and 30 on his lung. Best of luck to your Grandma and you as well. Email me if you'd like to know anything else.

Hi!

Radiation can burn and destroy anything (ref. Hiroshima) if used inappropriately, wrong kind, inappropriate dosing and/or localisation. The idea with therapeutic radiation is to damage cancer cells much more than normal cells and to give the normal cells time to repair which the cancer cells cannot do as effectively and to dose and localise the radiation very, very carefully. Ionising radiation damages particularly the DNA in the nucleus of the cells. Cells have different sensitivites and different capacities for repair and therapeutic radiation utilizes these sensitivities and repair capacities. Some cancers are very radiosensitive, some radioresistant, some normal tissues can tolerate alot some much less.

No, there is no burning of the cells inside -if your grandma smells burning as max few minute episodes she might be having temporal epileptic seizures -and needs to see a Neurologist (seizures are a common symptom of brain tumors and metastases and in temporal lobe seizures strange smells are a common symptom). If the smell is constant she might have something wrong in her nose -see her family practitioner to look in her nose -or be very anxious.
If you are serious about finding out about radiotherapy and cancer, look at the web page of any of the large cancer hospitals like mdanderson.org and follow the links, if you need more information.National cancer institute has a lot too nci.gov also for the public.
Skin damage is possible and many creams have been tried to prevent the damage, nothing is 100% sure for that. Look at those web pages to find out more. MDAnderson web pages have alot of data (not heresay) also of the so called alternative therapies.
A lot of strength and wisdom for you
wishes

mary a
who works in the field

radiatio can burn you inside and out sunscreen on the out side is the best thing for that as far as smelling my husband is taking radiation on the head and neck and he has an odor like rust the sores in the mouth from radiatio can be helped by making a mouth wash out of liquid hydro also make one out of bendryl mix each one make them half and half with water as far as her telling you she smelled fried brains maybe she has a good sense of humor about al of this good luck