Keeping an eye on your skin and looking out for new and suspicious (changing) moles is one way we can all help ourselves prevent skin cancer. Dr. Todd Minars of Minars Dermatology in Hollywood, Florida, joined his father’s practice in 2002, and discusses here why it can be so important to perform regular skin self-exams.
Doing a skin self-exam is always recommended. It involves simply looking for things on your skin that are new or changing. We tell people to maybe make a point once every couple of weeks when you get out of the shower, simply look in the mirror, look at your back. Get to know your moles.
The reason for doing that is that as dermatologist, we only see people once in a while. At that time, we certainly can spot things which look abnormal, but the biggest clue for skin cancer is when something is changing. The only way we can know that for sure is for the patient to tell us.
Biopsy or No Biopsy?
It is important for us to decide whether a lesion should be biopsied, which is how we can tell if it is cancerous or not, by sending it off to the lab for tests. If a lesion looks a bit funky but it has been there your entire life and is completely unchanged, you should just watch it, and there is no need at the current time for a biopsy. But only you can tell us that.
We may have you come back in six months, measure it, measure it again in six months and keep an eye on it.
But on the other hand, if you tell me that a mole is growing, that it was not there two months ago and now is steadily getting bigger or changing, then we would biopsy it. And if you do not do self-exams, you have no way of knowing if any of your moles are new and changing, and you cannot give me that information.
Hundreds of Moles
It can be especially difficult for us to keep on top of patients who have hundreds of moles, which is why it is especially important for them to do self-exams. It is difficult for us and for them to keep track as well, with those patients we often do some photographs so that we can compare at a later date to see if any change has occurred.
Nowadays, at least in our area, there are even photographers at some universities who specialize in full body photography, to get a baseline of all the moles. They take 25 pictures of a patient, and if something pops up we can nab one of the photos and compare. It is not done commonly here, but just done for high-risk patients, somebody who has a lot of moles and their father died of a melanoma, for example.
The information in the article is not intended to substitute for the medical expertise and advice of your healthcare provider. We encourage you to discuss any decisions about treatment or care with an appropriate healthcare provider.
