Melanoma signs

First off, let me tell you, that I am not a doctor, but a grieving sister. I just lost my brother to melanoma. This is a serious skin cancer, but if you take pro- action and take care of your skin, early detection has a huge success rate.

My brother ignored his. We are all told to watch out for changing moles etc, but his started out as a cut. He was showering and noticed what looked like a thin "paper cut" on his thigh, that did not hurt, and he couldn't remember cutting himself at all, it then formed a thick scab, that wouldn't heal.

But he just ignored it, and kept ignoring it. The scab would fall off and then form again. He kept putting antiseptic on it, thinking it had a minor infection, but then felt it was just being irritated by his jeans.

He left this scab so long, that finally it annoyed him after a year or so, and he went to get it dealt with. The doctor sent him to a surgeon who took a biopsy, with the horrid results of Stage 4 Melanoma Cancer, it was checked twice because of its beginnings, a cut rather than a mole. But by this time the melanoma cancer had spread to internal organs.

My brother David, died April 24, 2009 not able to battle this horrible cancer, because melanoma does not respond to traditional cancer treatments. The best defence is to have it cut off or out before it spreads.

So, map your body, get anything unusual checked out, including cuts that don't heal, or any skin irritation, it does not have to be a mole. If my brother had got it looked at when he found it, I would most likely be seeing him at the next family gathering. He was only 48 years old.

I am just as bad, as I never really wore sunscreen, and of course baked as a teenager to get that "glow" so, now I am more vigilant. I do not obsess with moles, but once a month or so, my husband and I check out each others moles and scars to see if anything has changed. My brother made us all promise (there are 3 siblings) that we would not be as stupid as he was, and not get these things check out.. There are other forms of skin cancer that are not quite as serious, so even if yours does not look like melanoma, anything different should be checked out.