The Adobe Flash Player is required to view this multimedia interactive. Get it here.

Area families say there’s ‘something in the air’

Former Middletown resident Michelle Walton sits with her brother Eric Daley in his Liberty Township home Saturday afternoon, September 26, 2009. Their father, a Middletown resident, died this February of brain cancer and since then Walton has discovered thirteen people she knows have the same form of cancer. Her findings have launched a state investigation of a possible brain cancer cluster in Middletown.

Photo by Jessica Uttinger, contributing photographer Former Middletown resident Michelle Walton sits with her brother Eric Daley in his Liberty Township home Saturday afternoon, September 26, 2009. Their father, a Middletown resident, died this February of brain cancer and since then Walton has discovered thirteen people she knows have the same form of cancer. Her findings have launched a state investigation of a possible brain cancer cluster in Middletown.

ENLARGE PHOTO

Cancer survivor has faithful style with classic influences
10/29/11
Casting for Recovery brings women to river
10/29/11
This disease does not discriminate
10/22/11
2 Miami Valley caregivers honored at fundraiser
10/22/11
Communication a priority after a cancer diagnosis
10/14/11
> More breast cancer articles

By Tiffany Y. Latta, Staff Writer 8:41 PM Sunday, October 25, 2009

MIDDLETOWN — Retired AK Steel worker Bill Daley was an avid golfer and marathon runner.

But a grade 4 malignant brain tumor, discovered in January 2008, caused him to lose his peripheral vision in both eyes. He suffered seizures, brain fog, slipped into a coma for about 10 days, and slowly lost his mobility. He died Feb. 9, 2009.

Daley’s children — son, Eric, 39, of Liberty Twp. and daughter, Michelle Daley Walton, 37, now of California — struggled to make sense of what had caused this in a seemingly healthy man.

“There has to be something in the water. Something in the air,’’ they feared.

Five years earlier, one of Daley’s best friends, Greg Lansaw, died of glioblastoma brain cancer, the most common and deadliest form of brain cancer.

Then Daly’s family learned that a friend, Jeff Jewell, formerly of Middletown, was in the hospital. The diagnosis: a grade 4 glioma.

“When Jeff got diagnosed I thought there has to be something about Middletown,’’ Eric Daley said.

So did his sister, a pharmaceutical saleswoman.

Walton asked everyone on her cell, email and Facebook contact lists to send information about anyone in Middletown affected by cancer.

The response was astounding. Walton discovered 11 people in Middletown were diagnosed with glioblastoma brain cancer since 2004.

“That just seemed alarming to me. Getting that number from just the people I know or one person removed just seemed like a lot,’’ Walton said.

Brain tumors affect an average of just 17 out of 100,000 Americans annually, said University Hospital Dr. Ronald Warnick. Of those, just five out of 100,000 are glioblastomas, Warnick said.

“None of them are that common,’’ Warnick said. “In a town of 51,000, we can expect two or three patients per year with glimoas or eight with primary brain tumors per year.’’

Walton presented her findings to Robert Indian, director of the Ohio Cancer Surveillance System. Indian is now investigating whether there is a brain cancer cluster in Middletown.

It is the second such cancer cluster investigation in Butler County. The first — a child thyroid cancer cluster — occurred in Trenton, but the results were inconclusive.

Indian gets more than 1,100 requests for cancer cluster investigations annually. Most, he said, are dismissed.

Officials are now trying to confirm the number of brain cancer cases in the area and will know in a couple weeks if there’s a need to investigate further.

Walton’s family and friends, especially the Lansaws and the Jewells, hope the investigation helps them find answers.

“It’s scary. I have children that were raised in Middletown,’’ said Greg Lansaw’s widow, Brenda, a data manager at Middletown High School.

Greg Lansaw was diagnosed at 45 and died a year later on September, 11, 2004, at age 46.

He was a marathon runner and a golfer, like his friend Bill Daley, and was also the golf coach at Miami University Middletown.

Doctors say age (men over 50), an inherited predisposition and radiation exposure increase risks. But ultimately, there’s no known cause.

“If these are all true glios, we are going to have to see what the rate turns out to be. But if you’re that individual with a brain tumor or a loved one, you really don’t care what the rate is,’’ Indian said. “But as a community, you’ve got an issue and you’re in a fight for your life.’’

Share this article