Eleanor Mondale's recovery is going well

Star Tribune

Last update: November 13, 2009 - 7:55 PM

In the first public update in more than two months, a website tracking Eleanor Mondale's recovery from brain cancer surgery says it is going well and that there has been "no sign of the tumor returning."

Mondale, the 49-year-old daughter of former Vice President Walter Mondale and Joan Mondale, and host of a morning talk show on WCCO Radio, has been recovering at her Twin Cities home since the surgery in August at the Mayo Clinic.

"Eleanor's scan today was CLEAN," read an entry made Thursday night on her Caringbridge.org Web page. She had her "first MRI halfway through the Avastin treatments (a new form of 'chemo' ... ). She's wiped out, but she's healing from the surgery -- and there was no sign of the tumor returning."

In February 2008, Mondale revealed an earlier cancer recurrence. She had surgery to remove a small tumor in the frontal lobe, the same spot where a cancerous tumor had been discovered in 2005, when she was told she had only six months to live. She had radiation and chemotherapy then, and by 2006 the tumor had vanished.

Mondale had been hosting a talk show on WCCO with Susie Jones since August 2006, but because of her illness, she has been absent since March 19. She also has worked on television for the E! cable channel and "CBS This Morning."

PAUL WALSH