Benign anatomical mistakes: incidentaloma

The concept of the "incidentaloma," a totally asymptomatic nonfunctional tumor that is clinically and biochemically silent and discovered "incidentally" in a totally asymptomatic patient, is a by-product of the evolving diagnostic techniques of the last three decades. Various authors have used the concept for "incidental" findings during diagnostic workup for symptoms unrelated to adrenal disease, or for "incidental" adrenal tumors unrelated to symptoms that could potentially be of adrenal origin. "Incidentaloma" has been used to encompass a wide and heterogeneous spectrum of pathologic entities including adrenocortical and medullary tumors, benign or malignant lesions, hormonally active or inactive lesions, metastases, infections, granulomas, infiltrations, cysts and pseudocysts, hemorrhages, and pseudoadrenal masses. The term "incidentaloma" does not indicate whether the mass is functional, or malignant, or adrenocortical in origin. "Incidentaloma" has also appeared in the literature in reference to other endocrine organs such as pituitary, thyroid, and parathyroids, as well as the liver or kidney. We question the scientific justification for this neologism and suggest that it should be abolished. Questionable lesions should be clearly and simply described as "incidentally found."