When cancer isn’t; rethinking the diagnosis of cancer to avoid unnecessary treatment and psychological trauma.

For a while, there has been talk within the medical profession regarding many of the normal variants that have been called cancer.   For most people, a diagnosis of cancer conjures up images of a life-threatening battle to stay alive, surgeries, and treatments that make you ill, cost a fortune, and can disfigure you.

In the past, the suspicion of cancer required constant monitoring, tests, and treatments for the disease were not usually curative.   The constant fear of the unknown is ever-present after a cancer diagnosis as a result.

Some growths or cancers as we currently label them have very little likelihood of being life-altering, yet they get lumped in with others that can be fatal if not addressed.

Our understanding of different cancers or growths and their trajectory according to the NY Times has improved markedly, and many just do not require treatment as previously thought.   Cancers such as prostate often do not require the types of treatments that can affect your quality of life for years to come.

The NY Times recently looked into the benefits of early detection and suggested that medicine needs to reclassify these diseases so people and their doctors do not make rash decisions that require treatment that is just not necessary.

Check out the article below

Not Everything We Call Cancer Should Be Called Cancer

Aug. 30, 2023

“You have cancer.”

Ask anyone who has been told this: It’s terrifying.

That’s one reason we need to rethink what we call cancer. Despite amazing advances in our understanding of the disease, we have neglected to update how we define what has been called the emperor of all maladies.

Some cancers have extraordinarily low risks of altering the quality or length of life but get lumped in with those that do. And that often leads to unnecessary treatment, disfigurement, side effects and a constellation of other psychological, relationship and financial issues.

We are oncologists with expertise in prostate and breast cancers. We believe the medical community must reconsider what we call cancer in its earliest manifestations. So do a growing number of cancer experts around the world.

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