Summer sun safety reminders amid Skin Cancer Awareness Month
ST. JOSEPH, Mo. (News-Press NOW) -- Of the different types of cancer, skin cancer is seen as one of the most common, according to the Skin Cancer Foundation.
Every year, over 5 million people are diagnosed with skin cancer in the U.S.
With summer on the horizon and May being known as Skin Cancer Awareness Month, officials are providing insight to ways people can stay safe and recognize any red flags.
The most dangerous form of skin cancer is melanoma, which results from melanocytes- or- the cells that produce melanin and give skin its pigment.
"The melanomas can metastasize," U.S. Dermatology Partners St. Joseph Nurse Practitioner Danielle Berg said. "If you see a lesion that is dark or changing color, then certainly those are the ones we want to see. But they also can go internally as well. So those with melanoma we follow pretty closely for five years generally after a melanoma removal."
Melanoma is known as the most dangerous because it can rapidly spread to other parts of the body. It can appear either as new growth or an existing mole.
The best practice to get tested early on and practice safety measures such as applying sun screen on days with higher UV rays.
"Avoid use of tanning beds, use sunscreen with higher SPF and just trying to stay out inside during the really high UV times of the day," Mosaic Director of Oncology Dana McDaniel said. "Using hats, using and sunglasses, those will all help and minimize some cancer of the skin."
Deb Singleton, a St. Joseph resident, has had three different types of cancer three different times.
"Some of them have said to me, why are you having this third cancer?" Singleton said. "And some people even think god's punishing them. That's just. No, he's not. Life is life."
Regardless of diagnoses, Singleton says there's one thing patients should do.
"You keep fighting, while you're here on this earth, you've got a purpose." Singleton said. "Good things happen to good people. Good things happen to bad people, and vice versa. But my family has been very supportive and always there for me."
