Redefining 'Cancer': What Cells Show Significant Signs of Danger?

Could health experts be over diagnosing cancer? A group of health experts believe so, according to the U.S. National Cancer Institute, and are calling for a redefinition of the very word itself.

In fact, a recent report suggests that many growths found through cancer screenings are pronounced as lethal, when in reality, they should be considered "indolent" according to a statement via the report.

Yet most patients don't understand that the "word 'cancer' often invokes the specter of an inexorably lethal process," wrote Drs. Laura Esserman of the University of California, San Francisco, Dr. Ian Thompson Jr. of the University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio, and Dr. Brian Reid of the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Institute in Seattle, via U.S. News and World Report.

In fact, Esseman said that cancer can take several forms, many of which do not result in metastases or death.

"More is not always better," she said, via the Washington Post. "It's pretty clear that cancer - the word now refers to a wide range of conditions, some of which will not progress and will not kill you.. . . We have to be a little bit more savvy."

The committee recommended changing the names for certain conditions and reserving the term "cancer" just for findings "with a reasonable likelihood of lethal progression if left untreated."

For instance, Otis Brawley, the chief medical officer of the American Cancer Society discusses how some women are getting bilateral mastectomies for ductal carcinoma in situ, which is not a cancer. "It's the world turned upside down," he said, via the New York Times.

However, removal of some cancerous cells early that may not show significant signs of danger, such as precancerous colon or cervical lesions can be life-saving.

What do you think?

More information regarding the report can be found in the Journal of the American Medication Association.