CNN’s Kasie Hunt had a benign brain tumor removed

CNN anchor and chief national affairs analyst Kasie Hunt said she had a benign brain tumor removed, calling the diagnosis “pretty surreal.”

The 36-year-old told People magazine that she had the growth removed last week by doctors from Penn Medicine. Hunt said that the tumor had been small, but it was not clear it was benign until the surgery. 

“And that, I think, was really the hardest part, was knowing that there was something in there, growing,” Hunt told People.

The 36-year-old told People magazine her health concerns first started when she began to experience bad headaches in March. A neurologist ordered an MRI and noticed something on the scan, which was confirmed by a follow-up.

She said that doctors checked to see if she had cancer but found nothing.

“No issues with skin or other things that might be more common in somebody that’s my age. So that was all really good news,” Hunt told People. “And my symptoms weren’t getting worse, so we thought, okay, this was likely migraines.”

In August, as her health started to worsen, she said that a separate scan started to indicate that what doctors had found in previous scans had started to grow. 

“Once we learned that, then we really had to take some action, because that was a really scary thing to learn,” Hunt said in the interview. “Once you see growth in the brain, that means that there is a tumor growing in the brain.”

Following the surgery, Hunt has another six to eight weeks before she is fully recovered. She took to Twitter to thank people for wishing her well after CNN anchor Jake Tapper asked people to pray for “a friend.”

“Thank you to everyone who answered @jaketapper’s earlier anonymous calls for prayers for a friend in need — me — I am 100 percent certain they made all the difference. You all are amazing and I feel so touched by grace,” Hunt tweeted on Friday.

Thank you to everyone who answered @jaketapper’s earlier anonymous calls for prayers for a friend in need — me — I am 100 percent certain they made all the difference. You all are amazing and I feel so touched by grace. https://t.co/hzQR4II7Sa

— Kasie Hunt (@kasie) October 15, 2021