Melanoma Monday: Protecting your skin

As it gets warmer you may be spending more time outdoors, but you need to make sure you’re taking care of your skin. It was a full house as people waited for their free screening at High Valley Dermatology and Dermatologic Surgery during their Melanoma Monday event.

“People who are uncomfortable seeing the dermatologist or feel like they don’t need to, but when they get the opportunity to at a free event like this they’ll come in. And we’ve been able to over the course of the years to scan well over a thousand people and have probably found a couple dozen melanomas in that time and dozens more other skin cancers,” says Dr. Brandon Miner.

They check for spots and things you may not catch, early detection is key.

“It’s curable if you catch it early. If you don’t, melanoma is one of the deadliest cancers. So catching it early is a good idea. And sometimes what brings somebody in is not the thing that’s the real concern. They’ll have a spot on their neck that bothers them, then we’ll look at their back and find a melanoma,” says Dr. Miner.

And when you don’t catch it early.

“If you wait until it invades in past only one millimeter in depth it becomes invasive cancer and can spread to the lymph nodes and other parts of the body.”

And the key to protecting your skin:

“Sunscreen, start at 10 in the morning reapply every two hours you’re going to be out. If you’re wet or sweating it’s every 80 minutes.”

It’s important to pay attention to any spots or new spots on your body and get them checked out.