Have You Paid Your Dermatologist a Visit Lately?

Your skin is great at detecting your health’s conditions. Beautiful, glowing skin is a likely result of eating healthy and taking good care of your body. When you’re tired and eating a lot more junk than salads, your skin is likely to share some unwanted spots, under eye bags, perhaps some new wrinkles …

Sometimes your body is trying to tell you something through your skin. A spot that might look like it’s more than acne. Perhaps a bump or an unusual red spot that doesn’t seem to be disappearing.

When is it time to pay your Dermatologist a visit?

I’ve recently had a few visits with my Dermatologist due to a very questionable spot that suddenly appeared on my face. It was a red scaly pre-cancerous legion. From the picture, you might notice it looking nothing more than what people might think is a mosquito bite or something very harmless. Luckily, I caught it in time before it turned into squamous cell carcinoma.

In case you’re wondering, a squamous cell carcinoma is one of the most common forms of skin cancer. It’s caused by a lifetime exposure of ultraviolet radiation, which is why skin experts (and your mom) always stress the importance of sun protection. It can appear on almost any part of your body.

Adults, if healthy and have no history of skin cancer should visit their dermatologist at least once per year for a full body skin checkup. Once you see your dermatologist for an exam, and he or she gets you and your family’s history, he or she may recommend that you have more than one exam per year.

Some signs to look out for are
-Family history
-Suspicious/change in mole or legion
-Fair skin
-Had skin cancer in the past

Aging skin should definitely be handled with care. When you’re young, you may not care so much about going out in the sun, getting as tanned as possible, and not truly caring about whether or not you wear sunscreen. Once you hit that lovely stage when you notice your skin isn’t truly what it used to be, you suddenly feel the need to start paying more attention. Perhaps even regretting the habits you had of going to tanning beds or laying out in the sun all hours of a hot day.

You can’t turn back time, but you can certainly do what you can to prevent further skin damage. When something doesn’t look right, ask an expert. Sometimes it does well to pay attention to your instincts. In many cases, it could save your life!