ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Oncol.
Sec. Neuro-Oncology and Neurosurgical Oncology
This article is part of the Research TopicInnovative Approaches in Glioma Therapy: Exploring New Therapeutic Frontiers- Volume IIView all 8 articles
Efficacy of local convection enhanced delivery of chemotherapy using an intracerebral osmotic pump in a rat model of glioblastoma
Provisionally accepted
John McDaid1,2*
Julian E Bailes1,2*Neilank K Jha3George Bobustuc4Reed Berlet1Cassidy Kessinger1Eliana Whitcomb1
John M Lee2,5Daniil P Askenov2,6,7
Matthew Walker6Azur Azapagic8Jade Bookwalter9Ata Ullah10Himanshu Sant11Jill Shea12,9
Bruce K Gale8,9- 1Department of Neurosurgery, Endeavor Health, Evanston, IL, United States
- 2The University of Chicago Pritzker School of Medicine, Chicago, United States
- 3Deep Brain BCI Corp., Wilmington, DE, United States
- 4Intent Medical Group, Endeavor Health Advanced Neurosciences Institute, Arlington Heights, IL, United States
- 5Department of Pathology, Endeavor Health, Evanston, IL, United States
- 6Department of Radiology, Endeavor Health, Evanston, IL, United States
- 7Department of Anesthesiology, Endeavor Health, Evanston, IL, United States
- 8Department of Mechanical Engineering, The University of Utah, Salt Lake City, UT, United States
- 9Department of Biomedical Engineering, The University of Utah, Salt Lake City, UT, United States
- 10Department of Biomedical Engineering, The University of Utah, Salt Lake City,UT, United States
- 11Department of Chemical Engineering, The University of Utah, Salt Lake City, UT, United States
- 12Department of Surgery, University of Utah School of Medicine, Salt Lake City, UT, United States
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Background: Modern protocols for the treatment of glioblastoma multiforme (GBM) involve resection surgery, followed by chemotherapy and radiation therapy and subsequently adjuvant chemotherapy. While modestly successful in prolonging overall survival, peripherally administered chemotherapy drugs have limited ability to cross the blood brain barrier (BBB), limiting their bioavailability, and thus efficacy, at the tumor site. One way of circumventing the BBB is direct delivery of chemotherapy to the tumor site. Direct application of chemotherapy into the resection cavity during surgery in the form of carmustine/bis-chloroethylnitrosourea (BCNU) wafers has had limited success, in part due to the need for wafer solubilization, which restricts drug distribution and efficacy. The primary limitation, however, is that the drug is only distributed over short distances, for a short time. Methods: In this study, we evaluated the efficacy of drug perfusion into the tumor resection cavity in a rat glioma model through convection enhanced delivery (CED), using an implanted microfluidic osmotic pump. We compared the effects of two alkylating agents, BCNU and temozolomide (TMZ), on tumor recurrence and survival. Results: Using pumps containing a high concentration of ferumoxytol — a superparamagnetic iron oxide nanoparticle (SPION) — tissue perfusion was demonstrated in vivo by MRI and by post-mortem histology, confirming the effectiveness of the microfluidic pump as a drug delivery device. When delivered by implanted pumps, BCNU (4mg/ml) showed significantly greater efficacy against tumor recurrence than either TMZ; 2-4mg/ml or control (a low concentration of SPION). Conclusion: BCNU may be an effective choice for CED-driven, locally delivered chemotherapy in GBM.
Keywords: Brain, Carmustine, Direct delivery, Osmotic pump, resection, temozolomide, tumor
Received: 24 Dec 2025; Accepted: 16 Feb 2026.
Copyright: © 2026 McDaid, Bailes, Jha, Bobustuc, Berlet, Kessinger, Whitcomb, Lee, Askenov, Walker, Azapagic, Bookwalter, Ullah, Sant, Shea and Gale. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence:
John McDaid
Julian E Bailes
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