Talk:Skin cancer: Difference between revisions

Benign skin neoplasms?

I wanted to read about benign skin growths. In the Cutaneous conditions article, this sentence appears: "In the Diseases of the skin include skin infections and skin neoplasms (including skin cancer)." But both "skin neoplasms" and "skin cancer" come to this article, which is 100% about skin cancer. But a Neoplasm is not always a malignant growth.

I agree that skin cancer is a complex subject that requires a lot of depth. However, is there a reason why that link from "Cutaneous conditions" doesn't go to Neoplasm or Benign tumor? However, neither of those two articles is specifically about cutaneous growths. This seems to be a hole in Wikipedia's coverage. Thank you for your time, Wordreader (talk) 06:17, 25 January 2016 (UTC)

Please ignore the References right below my post. I did not add them. Yours, Wordreader (talk) 06:20, 25 January 2016 (UTC)

carcinoma or cancer

Doc James I changed to basal cell carcinoma. That's the title of the WP article. It is the most widely used term in the sources too. Why the revert please?Charlotte135 (talk) 22:30, 28 April 2016 (UTC)

The widely ascribed acronym BCC also refers to basal cell carcinoma, not basal cell cancer.Charlotte135 (talk) 23:19, 28 April 2016 (UTC)

You said cancer.gov uses the term basal cell cancer in the place of basal cell carcinoma to support your revert. I checked the USA website and most entries also refer to BCC as carcinoma. And as I said, most reliable sources around the globe, including medical journals, all refer to BCC as basal cell carcinoma. Will revert to my change, based on all of this strong evidence. If you believe you are right, please show me how? Otherwise we'll just leave it as carcinoma.Charlotte135 (talk) 02:49, 29 April 2016 (UTC)

Cancer.gov uses basal cell skin cancer here [1]. It is the same and easier terminology. I therefore see nothing wrong with using it. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 13:11, 29 April 2016 (UTC)

Are you saying we should use the one isolated reference you provided to BCC, instead of the term all the reliable sources, including all medical journals use?Charlotte135 (talk) 20:46, 29 April 2016 (UTC)

Charlotte, part of what we try to do in writing Wikipedia articles about medicine is to use words people understand, without dumbing it down too much. It's a balancing act. That's why doc james is trying to accomplish. This is described in WP:MEDMOS. No one would argue with what you are saying about the literature; the issue is how we communicate that. Doc James is also trying to get this ready for the translation task force so it can be propagated. Jytdog (talk) 22:19, 29 April 2016 (UTC)

Jytdog, thanks for explaining and after reading WP:MEDMOS I can understand what you're both saying, but I'm concerned that with basal and squamous cell carcinoma it is so widely used in the literature and general community internationally, that now using a fringe term, may run the risk of creating unnecessary confusion, rather than achieving simplicity. Some may see this as a different form of cancer rather than what it still is. That is, basal cell carcinoma. I think this is where the balancing act comes in.You'll note I have not reverted, but would be interested in continuing this discussion please and hearing from some other editors on this point. Hope that all sounds reasonable and makes some sense. Let me know.Charlotte135 (talk) 02:10, 30 April 2016 (UTC)

I typically call it "basal cell skin cancer" when I am explaining it to patients. cancer.gov uses the term aswell so it is not exactly a fringe term.

Agree it is a balancing act. If you click on "basal cell skin cancer" it does give you the other possible terms. Have clarified the terms in the classification section Skin_cancer#Classification

I agree that in the technical literature "carcinoma" is more common. People who are okay with technical details have looks of sources available to them. We should IMO be writing more for the general population.

Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 07:49, 30 April 2016 (UTC)

calling it a "fringe term" is completely inappropriate. Jytdog (talk) 19:06, 30 April 2016 (UTC)

Fringe in the sense of not being used very often Jytdog, when referring to BCC. Let's say marginal, then. Basal cell carcinoma is the term so widely used around the world, in all medical journals, internet sites, books, blogs, newspapers, pop mags, common language, that calling it anything else is definitely a marginal or fringe term. BCC is the most common form of skin cancer and people are comfortable with the word carcinoma IMO. But we're getting off point here. And I want to stick to content. Do we now change all references to carcinoma on WP to cancer? Is that what you are both saying?

And before Doc James changed the term to skin cancer in the article, a couple of days ago, it was being referred to basal cell cancer. [2]. I changed it to basal-cell carcinoma and Doc James changed it to skin cancer. So it's a fresh debate. As I said, I want to put it to the community.Charlotte135 (talk) 22:58, 30 April 2016 (UTC)

I have nothing more to say here. Jytdog (talk) 07:36, 1 May 2016 (UTC)

You obviously see my point then Jytdog, regarding your previous comment, and that calling BCC something other than basal-cell carcinoma is counterproductive to the project.Charlotte135 (talk) 08:33, 1 May 2016 (UTC)