Shannen Doherty recently shared a positive update about her ongoing battle with stage 4 breast cancer. The former “Beverly Hills, 90210” star shared that she will be starting a new “miracle” cancer infusion treatment. The actress shared the new information while appearing on a new episode of her “Let’s Be Clear” podcast, which featured her oncologist, Dr. Amin Mirhadi. The 52-year-old did not reveal what kind of infusion treatment she was getting, but described it as a positive move. “After four treatments, we didn’t really see a difference and everybody wanted me to switch, and I just was like, ‘We’re gonna keep going with this and see,'” Doherty said on the podcast. “After the sixth, seventh treatment we really saw it breaking down the blood-brain barrier. Do I call that a miracle? Yeah. For me, that happens to be a miracle right now. That I sort of rolled the dice and said, ‘Let’s keep going.'” According to the Cleveland Clinic, the blood-brain barrier is a protective layer lining the inner surface of blood vessels inside the brain and plays a vital role in maintaining function of the brain and nervous system.
The actress also discussed the importance of staying positive and how beneficial it can be to the patient’s mental and physical health while battling something as hard as cancer. “Hope is always there. I can die today, I can die in 20 years, I don’t know. I can die walking outside of my house and a tree falling on me or a bus hitting me or whatever. Or I can die of cancer,” Doherty said. “But all I can do is live each day in as much of a positive manner with a lot of hope as I can and embrace it and be like, ‘Wow, I get to wake up again today, and what do I get to do?’ I think that positivity that you bring into your life helps you with your whole body.”
Doherty was first diagnosed with breast cancer in 2015. She went into remission in 2017, but the cancer returned in 2019. In June 2023, she revealed on Instagram that the cancer had spread to her brain. In November, Doherty shared that the cancer cells had spread to her bones and that she was still undergoing treatment and seeking out clinical trials. One month later, she started the “Let’s Be Clear” podcast as a “live memoir podcast.”