Melanoma Monday

[Cyfan4good]

May is skin cancer awareness month and it's Melanoma Monday. If you haven't done so yet please schedule your annual appointment with a dermatologist for a screening.
Skin cancer can be deadly so educate yourself about skin cancer and encourage your family members and friends to do the same.
This morning while watching the Today show I learned that Kentucky football player Joshua Paschal is battling advanced Melanoma. This surprised me as it's widely thought that people with dark skin pigment are at much less risk for skin cancer. Joshua's cancer was a rare type of melanoma that he thought was a wart on the bottom of his foot. Joshua is still undergoing treatment for his form of melanoma, see the link to his story below.
I am just over three years into my personal battle with advanced Melanoma. We are so thankful for Dr. Markovich and his Melanoma team at the Mayo Clinic where we've been traveling at least every four weeks for the last three years. Much love and appreciation to my wife for her loving care and assistance throughout our cancer journey.

Take care all, Cyfan4good

https://www.skincancer.org/get-…/skin-cancer-awareness-month

https://www.today.com/health

#MySkinCancerJourney

 

[VeloClone]

I hadn't been in for quite a few years and when I finally did I had two questionable spots removed last fall and one they had to go back in and take more because it was "severely abnormal". (The Mrs. had fun with that.) I now am on a schedule of every 6 months.

Generally if they find it early it is little more than an inconvenience but if you wait, it can be very, very serious.

Get it checked, people!

 

[ImJustKCClone]

I hadn't been in for quite a few years and when I finally did I had two questionable spots removed last fall and one they had to go back in and take more because it was "severely abnormal". (The Mrs. had fun with that.) I now am on a schedule of every 6 months.

Generally if they find it early it is little more than an inconvenience but if you wait, it can be very, very serious.

Get it checked, people!

I like your wife!
I've been blessedly backed off now to alternating years.

 

[mj4cy]

Thanks for the reminder! Gonna call now to schedule an appt.

 

[isuno1fan]

Been getting annual skin checks for 10 yrs plus. Probably had more than 20 spots biopsies. 2 abnormal to date. It’s easy to prevent if you just get it looked at annually.

 

[mj4cy]

Just got mine scheduled for next month. Some things in life we can't control, some we can, and some we can reduce risks by being proactive.

 

[intrepid27]

My wife has a rough spot on her jawline. For the past two annual physicals she pointed it out to her doctor who told her "it was probably eczima nothing to worry about". She went to a dermatologist who found 4 other spots that also were positive for cancer. The one on her jawline was squamous cells and she ended up with a 4 inch scar after the removal. .

Bottom line- DON'T rely on your normal physician.!!

 

[jsb]

Big difference between the 3 types of skin cancer. Two are fairly easy to treat. Melanoma is not as easy and needs to be caught early. The spots often show up in odd spots.

Wear sunscreen all of the time!

 

[capitalcityguy]

I had some cancerous spots removed a few yrs back, so I’m careful to check regularly. That said, I’ve never been OK just shrugging my shoulders and accepting that this type of disease just happens randomly.

Just throwing this out there. If you take some time and do some searching on the internet, you can find some amazing testimonials from people who have strong personal evidence that changing their diet drastically changed how their skin reacts to the sun. Some even claiming they no longer burn. Other seeing sun damaged skin seemingly heal over time (that isn’t supposed to happen).

I’ve long wondered what we were doing wrong that skin cancer has become such a big issue considering people are inside much more now, then they were in the past. I do think it is tied to diet and the fact it is very possible our bodies were not meant to digest much of what we are feeding it and as a result, it negatively effects the resiliency of our skin.

https://www.google.com/search?q=car....69i57j0l2.14518j0j8&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8

This will be my first summer since I drastically changed my diet (last Oct 1) , so I’m anxious to see if I notice any difference myself. If not, nothing lost but at least I gave it a try. I’m just not ready to accept we can’t inhabit the planet and enjoy the outdoors without smothering chemicals on our bodies before we go outside.

 

[VeloClone]

I had some cancerous spots removed a few yrs back, so I’m careful to check regularly. That said, I’ve never been OK just shrugging my shoulders and accepting that this type of disease just happens randomly.

Just throwing this out there. If you take some time and do some searching on the internet, you can find some amazing testimonials from people who have strong personal evidence that changing their diet drastically changed how their skin reacts to the sun. Some even claiming they no longer burn. Other seeing sun damaged skin seemingly heal over time (that isn’t supposed to happen).

I’ve long wondered what we were doing wrong that skin cancer has become such a big issue considering people are inside much more now, then they were in the past. I do think it is tied to diet and the fact it is very possible our bodies were not meant to digest much of what we are feeding it and as a result, it negatively effects the resiliency of our skin.

https://www.google.com/search?q=carnivore+diet,+sun&rlz=1C1GCEA_enUS749US749&oq=carnivore+diet,+sun&aqs=chrome..69i57j0l2.14518j0j8&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8

This will be my first summer since I drastically changed my diet (last Oct 1) , so I’m anxious to see if I notice any difference myself. If not, nothing lost but at least I gave it a try. I’m just not ready to accept we can’t inhabit the planet and enjoy the outdoors without smothering chemicals on our bodies before we go outside.

The longer we live as a whole the more of an issue this becomes. And 100+ years ago sunbathing was not a thing. If people went to the beach they generally wore some swim garment that covered the majority of their skin. People also wore hats most of the time they were outside which helped protect their heads from the sun.

 

[capitalcityguy]

The longer we live as a whole the more of an issue this becomes. And 100+ years ago sunbathing was not a thing. If people went to the beach they generally wore some swim garment that covered the majority of their skin. People also wore hats most of the time they were outside which helped protect their heads from the sun.

I'm not only thinking back 100 yrs but also thousands of yrs we inhabited the planet. Even going back 100yrs, you had so much more manual labor working outside (think Ag related).

People are making claims that they are being able to control this with diet. I think it is too early to either accept that or dismiss it.

 

[VeloClone]

I'm not only thinking back 100 yrs but also thousands of yrs we inhabited the planet. Even going back 100yrs, you had so much more manual labor working outside (think Ag related).

People are making claims that they are being able to control this with diet. I think it is too early to either accept that or dismiss it.

Go back thousands of years and very few people were living past 50. That is generally about the time that skin cancer starts to becomes an issue. If you die before you contract it the numbers will be low. Besides that, how do we know people weren't getting it? There were lots of accounts of leprosy and scholars generally agree that just about any skin abnormality was classified as the catch all "leprosy". Someone could die of skin cancer and have it chalked up to "leprosy".

 

[capitalcityguy]

Go back thousands of years and very few people were living past 50. That is generally about the time that skin cancer starts to becomes an issue. If you die before you contract it the numbers will be low. Besides that, how do we know people weren't getting it? There were lots of accounts of leprosy and scholars generally agree that just about any skin abnormality was classified as the catch all "leprosy". Someone could die of skin cancer and have it chalked up to "leprosy".

Fewer lived past 50 because infant mortality was much higher, life was more dangerous (tribal conflicts, inconsistent food supply, etc). but if a person made it past a certain age, they actually lived about us long as you or I are expected to. I don't have time to find the link, but cancer (of all types i) is a more recent development and it is found in much greater instances with some societies TODAY compared to others. I believe our standard American diet has a lot to do with that.

 

[Cyched]

Go back thousands of years and very few people were living past 50. That is generally about the time that skin cancer starts to becomes an issue. If you die before you contract it the numbers will be low. Besides that, how do we know people weren't getting it? There were lots of accounts of leprosy and scholars generally agree that just about any skin abnormality was classified as the catch all "leprosy". Someone could die of skin cancer and have it chalked up to "leprosy".

That's boring. We need to point fingers and opine.

 

[capitalcityguy]

Go back thousands of years and very few people were living past 50. That is generally about the time that skin cancer starts to becomes an issue. If you die before you contract it the numbers will be low. Besides that, how do we know people weren't getting it? There were lots of accounts of leprosy and scholars generally agree that just about any skin abnormality was classified as the catch all "leprosy". Someone could die of skin cancer and have it chalked up to "leprosy".

This wasn't article I was looking for, but provides same evidence.

Of 397 ancients in total, 99 died violently by murder, suicide or in battle. Of the remaining 298, those born before 100BC lived to a median age of 72 years. Those born after 100BC lived to a median age of 66. (The authors speculate that the prevalence of dangerous lead plumbing may have led to this apparent shortening of life).

The median of those who died between 1850 and 1949? Seventy-one years old – just one year less than their pre-100BC cohort.

http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20181002-how-long-did-ancient-people-live-life-span-versus-longevity

It is interesting that you said 50. From the article:

This belief that our species may have reached the peak of longevity is also reinforced by some myths about our ancestors: it’s common belief that ancient Greeks or Romans would have been flabbergasted to see anyone above the age of 50 or 60, for example

 

[NickTheGreat]

My dad is a farmer and spends the majority of his time outside. He had some spots removed some decades ago. He wears sunscreen more than most farmers nowadays.

Wear sunscreen people!

 

[CascadeClone]

Not to detract from the seriousness of the topic (I wear large brimmed hats all the time in the sun), but whenever I hear melanoma all I can think of is:

"Hi!! Buck Melanoma, Maisy Russel's wart."

 

[VeloClone]

This wasn't article I was looking for, but provides same evidence.



http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20181002-how-long-did-ancient-people-live-life-span-versus-longevity

It is interesting that you said 50. From the article:

Great job. You should probably have quoted the part about how what you quoted was a study that looked at the ages of famous and noble people. The article even admits that the cited studies of roman aristocracy and the famous are going to be skewed because of life advantages and the very fact that you have to live for quite a while to achieve the notoriety.

I didn't say no one was living past 50. Our life spans are similar but a much greater number of average people are reaching it than in the past.

The article talks quite a bit about how even in average working folk people are recorded reaching ripe old ages, but the difficulty of life made it much less common.

What about if we look in the other direction in time – before any records at all were kept?

Although it is obviously difficult to collect this kind of data, anthropologists have tried to substitute by looking at today's hunter-gatherer groups, such as the Ache of Paraguay and Hadza of Tanzania. They found that while the probability of a newborn’s survival to age 15 ranged between 55% for a Hadza boy up to 71% for an Ache boy, once someone survived to that point, they could expect to live until they were between 51 and 58 years old. Data from modern-day foragers, who have no access to medicine or modern food, write Michael Gurven and Cristina Gomes, finds that “while at birth mean life expectancies range from 30 to 37 years of life, women who survive to age 45 can expect to live an additional 20 to 22 years” – in other words, from 65 to 67 years old.

Archaeologists Christine Cave and Marc Oxenham of Australian National University have recently found the same. Looking at dental wear on the skeletons of Anglo-Saxons buried about 1,500 years ago, they found that of 174 skeletons, the majority belonged to people who were under 65 – but there also were 16 people who died between 65 and 74 years old and nine who reached at least 75 years of age.
...

Our maximum lifespan may not have changed much, if at all. But that’s not to delegitimise the extraordinary advances of the last few decades which have helped so many more people reach that maximum lifespan, and live healthier lives overall.

I didn't get on here to argue about this. The fact remains that a greater percentage of people are reaching a ripe old age and medicine is able to more accurately diagnose disease than in centuries and even millennia past. There have been throughout history people who wasted away or died of unknown and/or unrecorded ailments which haven't made it into the statistics of disease or were even mis-recorded as an entirely different ailment.

There is no doubt that diet, nutrition and environment influence the diseases we contract, but there are many who put the entire blame on what we eat/wear/are exposed to when in all likelihood the truth is much more complex than that.

 

[cycopath25]

We missed the opportunity as April was Testicular Cancer Awareness month. We could of been having Testicle Tuesdays!

 

[ImJustKCClone]

We missed the opportunity as April was Testicular Cancer Awareness month. We could of been having Testicle Tuesdays!

Well, some of us anyway.
Then again, I could probably assist my hubby...