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Overdiagnosis is now a health challenge recognised across many nations. Debates about its definition continue, but in short, overdiagnosis happens when health systems routinely diagnose people in ways that do not benefit them or that even do more harm than good, argue Ray Moynihan and colleagues. Australia [...]

Given recent evidence of overdiagnosis and overtreatment of small papillary thyroid cancers (PTCs) and other low-risk cancers, strategies are needed to help patients consider less invasive treatment options. The objective was to determine which factors influence treatment preferences for patients with PTC, and the trade-offs in treatment factors people [...]

Do survey participant treatment preferences and anxiety levels differ when papillary thyroid cancer is described with or without the term cancer? In this randomized crossover study of 550 adults without thyroid cancer, when papillary thyroid cancer was described as a lesion or as abnormal cells (rather than as a cancer), [...]

Removing the cancer label in low risk conditions that are unlikely to cause harm if left untreated may help reduce overdiagnosis and overtreatment, argue Brooke Nickel and colleagues. Renaming low risk conditions labelled as cancer. Nickel B, Moynihan R, Barratt A, Brito J, McCaffery J.  BMJ 2018; 362:k3322 [...]