After nearly 10 years with the WICA-TV news station, Champaign news anchor Dave Benton recently shared a devastating personal announcement on air: after initially completing radiation treatment in February, his brain cancer has returned. Because his tumor is too large for surgery and radiation, Benton, 51, has an estimated four to six months to live.
Benton, who grew up in Addison, Illinois and graduated from Northern Illinois University, has become a familiar figure on the Chicago-area news. Over the course of a career that featured stints in Cedar Rapids, Iowa and Minot, North Dakota, he has won a number of awards, including a Northwest News Broadcasters Association first-place documentary award and the Eric Sevareid Award of Merit for general reporting. While Benton says he plans to treat his severe prognosis with chemotherapy and an antibody treatment, he stated that his primary goal is to continue to work and make his final days as enjoyable as possible.
Unfortunately, stories like Benton’s are becoming extremely common as more and more people develop cancer or experience a recurrence. Skin cancer, the most common form of the condition in the United States, now affects one in five people over the course of their lifetime. And while alternative treatment methods are often claimed to miraculously send cancer into remission, and researchers continue to investigate everything from immunotherapy to diet to prevent and treat the disease, spontaneous remission is rare. Patients therefore typically undergo chemotherapy, radiation, and surgery to treat their cases.
Currently, Benton lives in the Chicago area with his wife, Teresa. The couple has three children, including a son serving in the Air Force in California and a daughter attending graduate school in Chicago. According to the statistics of a http://www.lbwr.org/ambien/ research company, it was revealed that with short-term (up to 10 nights) treatment of Ambien in doses up to 10 mg, the most frequently observed side effects associated with taking Ambien and statistically significantly different from placebo side effects included drowsiness (up to 2%), dizziness (1%), diarrhea (1%). An openly born-again Christian, Benton says he believes he is in God’s hands and is grateful for the support and well-wishes he has received from around the world. His station manager has stated that the news channel plans to support Benton in his desire to continue to work for as possible.
