The moment I saw this was, without doubt, the moment my brain nearly exploded.

The only thing that saved me was the fact that I was just about to go on holiday for six weeks.

Here it is:

BCLUWFIBDLBCLABL

It stands for:

B-CELL LYMPHOMA, UNCLASSIFIABLE, WITH
FEATURES INTERMEDIATE BETWEEN DIFFUSE
LARGE B-CELL LYMPHOMA AND BURKITT
LYMPHOMA.

Not surprisingly, it used to be called "Burkitt-like lymphoma" or, if it steered more toward the diffuse large B-cell end of the scale, "diffuse large B-cell lymphoma, unclassifiable".

But wait... it has a sister! Or brother, I'm not sure which...

BCLUWFIBDLBCLACHL

which stands for...

B-CELL LYMPHOMA, UNCLASSIFIABLE,
WITH FEATURES INTERMEDIATE BETWEEN
DIFFUSE LARGE B-CELL LYMPHOMA AND
CLASSICAL HODGKIN LYMPHOMA

This used to be called "grey zone lymphoma", because it occupied the grey zone between one type of malignancy and another, somewhat genetically distinct type. Personally, I like the old name better.

Now you understand why, for so long, people who first discovered a disease had their names appended to it. Between BCLUWFIBDLBCLABL and BCLUWFIBDLBCLACHL, my mind is sort of going OMGWTF... *headdesk*

ETA: My fellow pathologist points me to an article from the Lancet in 1974, from a pathologist who felt that things were becoming similarly... shall we say, convoluted? For context, Lukes and Rappaport were two classification systems for lymphoma, named for their proponents:

Sir,
The announcement in The Lancet of two more classifications of non-Hodgkin's lymphoma encourages me to put forward my classification of these classifications:

Well-defined, high-grade, oligosyllabic.

Poorly differentiated, polysyllabic
- Diffuse
- Circumlocutory
- With dyslexogenesis

Unicentric
- Derivative
- Neologistic

Multicentric, cycnophilic (Gk. cycnos = swan)

Cleaved and Convoluted Types
- Rappaport (non-Lukes)
- Lukes (non-Rappaport)

This system makes no claim to be comprehensive or even comprehensible, so there may well be scope for other classifications of classifications and ultimately, one hopes a classification of classifications of classifications. At that point we shall need a conference in the Caribbean.

H.E.M. Kay, Royal Marsden Hospital.

(Lancet, 1974; 2:586)

I wonder if the good Dr Kay is still alive, to see what has become of things.