While getting ready for work one morning, Chandler Hussey, chatted with her adult son on the phone. It was a typical day, until she woke up surrounded by paramedics and her son. “I guess I went unconscious on the phone,” she recalled. “I woke up feeling like nothing happened and didn’t understand why they were at my house.”

After some convincing, Hussey went to Tucson Medical Center’s Emergency Department to get checked out. Tests revealed that she had a meningioma, a noncancerous tumor that arises from the membranes surrounding the brain and the spinal cord. This caused a seizure and was leading to vision loss in her left eye. She was referred to Dr. Jessey Chugh, a neurosurgeon at TMC, to evaluate and treat her. 

“The MRI showed a 5-centimeter skull-base tumor,” said Dr. Chugh. “It was pushing on the carotid artery and the left optic nerve, causing vision loss. Because these types of tumors are slow growing, we often don’t find them until they are causing pressure on the brain or nerves.”

Since Hussey is young, otherwise healthy and showing symptoms from the tumor, surgery was deemed the best option, complemented by embolization to reduce blood supply to the tumor, showcasing the need for a multidisciplinary approach in complex cases. 

Dr. Chugh is a dual trained open and endovascular neurosurgeon who also specializes in skull base surgery and brain tumors. For this patient, Dr. Chugh performed an embolization of the tumor prior to surgery.

“It’s nice to be able to tackle such complex issues in multiple different ways,” Dr. Chugh said. “Having knowledge about the vascular anatomy and the tumor part allows me to put those two fields together for a comprehensive approach to treating complex problems. Because I can treat problems in the Cath Lab or in the Operating Room, it allows me to figure out what the best, durable and safest thing to do is as opposed to a one-sized-fits-all approach.”

Hussey’s surgeries were a success, and she is feeling much better. After going through this event, she now realizes that the symptoms she’s had for years, such as headaches and declining vision, were from the tumor. She is grateful for the care she received from Dr. Chugh and the TMC team.

“The whole experience was really good,” she said. “Dr. Chugh couldn’t have been more amazing. He has been the one through all of this to keep me calm and make me as comfortable as I could be. He personally took my staples out. He doesn’t have the nurses do it. He has a great bedside personality.”

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