SEPTEMBER 29, 2009 — A study by British dermatologists showing that melanoma incidence isn’t actually increasing, but that doctors are simply diagnosing more thin, benign lesions and calling them melanomas, got substantial coverage in The New York Times on Monday.

“In recent years there has been a sharp rise in reported cases of malignant melanoma, the deadliest form of skin cancer. But a British study has found evidence that the epidemic may be due at least in part to ‘diagnostic drift,’ a growing tendency to identify and treat benign lesions as malignant cancers,” The Times reported. “The findings may raise the temperature in an already-heated controversy.”

Broken down by thickness, the new study showed that only the thinnest lesions were increasing and that the cure rate of removal of those lesions was 100 percent, raising questions as to whether or not they were truly malignant lesions or simply benign tissue.

“One possible explanation is that dermatologists and pathologists are finding cases earlier, treating them, and preventing more serious disease from developing,” The Times reported. “But melanoma is commonly diagnosed at various stages of severity, and if its incidence were truly increasing, the authors write, there would be increases found in all stages of the illness, not just the earliest.”

This publication is destined to spark a reaction from the American dermatology community, which has quietly put down this suggestion for more than a decade. Publications in the United States have asked the same question, but none with as much precision as the new British study.

Dr. Marianne Berwick, a former epidemiologist at the Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York who has published several papers critical of the assertion that sunlight and melanoma are directly related, told The Times the new British study is convincing. “A lot of dermatologists will argue that they’re getting better at diagnosing melanoma, but I don’t think that’s very likely,” Berwick told The Times. “They’re taking a lesion that would not be diagnosed as melanoma 20 years ago and calling it melanoma.”

To read the Times story click here.