“Must a name mean something?” Alice asks Humpty Dumpty, only to get this answer: “When I use a word…it means just what I choose it to mean—neither more nor less.”1

In scientific writing, a common statement is that there are no right or wrong words but there are better and worse choices.2 This means that choice of words, or even of a word, matters. Worse word choices are those that do not add clarity to an important topic and thereby risk obscuring truth. Vague words in science very likely create or add to misunderstandings about health, illness, and disease, making vague words wrong words. We have no room for vague words and misunderstandings in oncology nursing or in nursing research or practice generally. We need specificity and explicitness so that we know to whom we may fittingly apply research findings and to whom we may not. Our commitment as nurse scientists and nurses in cancer care must go beyond attentiveness to choosing the right or wrong word—we must also be sure that we have not omitted words that would add understanding and avoid misunderstanding.

But words about data can be forceful. We have learned with certainty during this pandemic that scientific thought alone, or data alone, do not alter human behavior. Relatedly, scientific thought and data do not alone dissipate human bias directed toward other humans. Because of word potency, we as oncology nurse researchers and nurses must consciously use words with purpose that accurately include and exclude persons with clear justification and clarify and specify evidence-based findings. Doing so increases the chances of research findings helping others. Equally so, we must be explicit about when our findings do not apply to certain groups of humans and thus may not help them.

In oncology nursing, we have the skills and ability to affect the health and well-being of individuals from birth to end of life and that of the communities and nations wherein these individuals reside.3 To fully maximize this ability, we need our research and our practice to be as inclusive of others as they can be. New knowledge from all could mean care and benefit for all. All should benefit from our knowledge generation and knowledge application efforts.

Being inclusive is a treasured value in our research and our practice. But inclusiveness is best when it reflects explicitness about who participated in the research, who the findings represent, and who the findings do not represent. In oncology, we have confirmed and refined information about human characteristics that are risk features for certain cancers such as race, ethnicity, age, and gender. Additional essential words in oncology nursing research are about important life descriptors such as faith beliefs, culture, economics, and family and friend relations. These words also represent risk features that can influence disease and treatment outcomes. If we do not study the meaning of these words in our care recipients, we lose the chance to influence their health behaviors in a beneficial way.

Life descriptors such as those named above are socially constructed—they are based on individual or shared life experiences. These words likely have 1 meaning for some individuals or communities but quite different meaning for others. It is through the meaning of these words that human behavior can be understood, respected, and informed. When meaning is made clear, it aids in making our research findings accurately inclusive and explanatory. Word meaning helps us understand how others respond to our care efforts, and how—and even why—we give care in the way that we do. Explicitness in words brings us closer to word meaning, to understanding human behavior, and to helping others through mutually understood words.

If our findings do not apply to certain individuals, let us be clear about that through our word choice. The efforts of individuals affected by cancer need not be invested in findings that “do not apply.” Research journals are intended to advance the progress of science in a certain field. CANCER NURSING: An International Journal for Cancer Care Research is a specialty research journal that seeks to publish new evidence-based information that will, immediately or in the longer term, guide the practice of oncology nursing for all who need our care. CANCER NURSING seeks to publish findings that are described in specific words with explicit meaning that do not contribute to misunderstandings. To do this, I ask that each of us think carefully about our word choice—better or worse, clear or obscuring. Would the word choice accurately describe to whom the findings apply? Would this word choice more accurately bring the potential of benefit to others? Participants in our research and recipients of our care suffer from cancer. They cannot find benefit from obscure or worse words. We must be inclusive in our research and in our care, and we must be explicit about to whom our findings apply. Furthermore, at the point of care, we need to be explicit about who responds well or not when we apply our evidence-based findings. Our choice of words matters.

All my very best,

Pamela S. Hinds, PhD, RN, FAAN
Department of Nursing Science
Professional Practice & Quality Outcomes
Children's National Hospital
Washington, DC

1. Carroll L. Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass. Canterbury Classics. San Diego, CA: Printers Row Publishing Group; 2016. 2. Zeiger M. Essentials of Writing Biomedical Research Papers. 2nd ed. New York: McGraw-Hill; 2000. 3. Hinds PS, Linder L. Pediatric Oncology Nursing: Defining Care Through Science. Cham, Switzerland: Springer Nature Publishers; 2020.