Talk:List of incurable diseases

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Hi. I created this article as a way to make sure that there were articles on all these incurable diseases, plus I tend to like lists. So, after creating the list, I can go down one by one and create articles for those incurable diseases for which no article yet exists--if any. I have some medical background but am no expert so feel free to correct any mistakes I make.Giovanni33 09:09, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

Fixed a few typos. There may be more, but I really can't tell without checking one by one. It seems like it might be useful to group the diseases by how you get them. Maybe infectious, genetic, and others. (I came across this list while trying to find out what infectious diseases are incurable.) BTW, does Rabies belong on this list? Aij 09:22, 1 April 2007 (UTC)

Autism is not a disease, it's a disorder. The main problem with it being on this list is that autism cannot be passed from person to person or animal to animal or animal to person. Nor can it be acquired by some other means. I realise there is much controversy over the disorder (is it genetic or developed etc) but it does not belong here. It isn't a disease. Also, Rabies isn't entirely incurable, that is, it is incurable at later stages of the disease, but can be treated if caught early enough. And I'm sure I've heard of rabies victims being able to walk freely from hospital having been 'cured' of late stage rabies. This was on the news recently I think. I'm not entirely sure though... The Lilac Pilgrim 09:33, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

• It would be useful, as aij points out, to organize this list into categories, e.g., infectious diseases (all presumably treatable), degenerative or metabolic diseases such as cancer (many different diseases), hypertension, diabetes, etc (true cures rarely possible), genetic "diseases" such as PKU, Tay-Sachs, familial alzheimers, fatal familial insomnia (truly incurable at this point, symptomatic treatment and genetic counseling only); syndromes and disorders such as as autism, cancer, schizophrenia, ADD, tinnitus, common cold etc., which are collections of different diseases (caused by different agents) grouped under diagnostic categories (treatment varies with the actual disease within the category; some curable, some not). Gribskov 13:20, 18 October 2007 (UTC)

• What is considered a cure? By definition, disease means something that causes discomfort; if you relieve the discomfort, is that a cure? Does insulin therapy cure diabetes? If you require a treatment for life (say for high cholesterol), and it completely resolves the disease, are you cured (if not, many of the "diseases" on this list are by definition impossible to cure, ever). If you have one cell of an infectious agent left in your body does that mean you are not cured ? If so, most cancers cannot be cured; Furthermore, each of us carries many viruses whose symptoms have entirely disappeared, but nevertheless stay with us forever. A good example is chicken pox, BTW incurable, which remains resident in your cells and can reoccur at any time as shingles. Don't forget that life, an 100% fatal disease, is incurable.Gribskov 13:20, 18 October 2007 (UTC)

• Contrary to the comment at the bottom of the page (IMO belongs here) bone marrow transplants are probably not a cure since the cancer often recurs afterwards. this indicates that it successfully provides a source of blood stem cells, but whatever killed the first set is still active and uncured ( Giralt & Champlin, 1994, Lee et al., 2000 ).

Sergio A. Giralt and Richard E. Champlin, Leukemia Relapse After Allogeneic Bone Marrow Transplantation: A Review, Blood 84, 3603-3612 (1994)

K-H Lee, J-H Lee, S Kim, J-S Lee, S-H Kim and W-K Kim, High frequency of extramedullary relapse of acute leukemia after allogeneic bone marrow transplantation, Bone Marrow Transplantation 26, 147-152 (2000).

Gribskov 14:41, 18 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Cancer

On the hypnosis page, it is claimed that cancer is an incurable disease. Any authority to weight in on this inconsistency with this list? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 213.113.60.164 (talk) 14:39, 17 February 2008 (UTC)