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Helena’s story — “Dad’s diagnosis made me suddenly aware of my own melanoma risk.”

A man, woman, and child share a joyful moment at the beach, symbolizing the need for vigilance regarding melanoma risks
MoleMap Team
April 26, 2023
5 minutes

With her fair skin and high num­ber of moles, Hele­na Ale­mao — who lives on the Cen­tral Coast of New South Wales — knew she should be care­ful in the sun. ​“I burn eas­i­ly and try to wear sun­screen as much as pos­si­ble. I must admit though, I didn’t always wear it every day.”

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Dad's melanoma diagnosis

The risk of skin can­cer came to the fore­front of Helena’s mind last year when her dad was diag­nosed with melanoma.

“It all hap­pened very quick­ly. A spot appeared on his arm which, at first, looked like an ordi­nary pim­ple. With­in a week or two it had become larg­er, changed in shape (it became ​‘odd’ look­ing) and con­tained dif­fer­ent colours (pur­ple, green, and dark red). He was diag­nosed straight away, but it had already spread to the lymph nodes under his arm.

“After under­go­ing a cou­ple of surg­eries — one on his fore­arm to remove the mole and two lat­er surg­eries to remove the lymph nodes in his under­arm — and radi­a­tion treat­ment, thank­ful­ly, Dad has been giv­en the all clear. For now.”

Patient Story Helena 2

I made get­ting a skin check a priority

“Not only did I have fair skin and many moles on my body, but now I also had a fam­i­ly his­to­ry of skin can­cer. I felt real­ly con­cerned about my own skin health and want­ed to take all the nec­es­sary pre­cau­tions I could. My GP rec­om­mend­ed that I have a skin can­cer check. I’d already heard of MoleMap, so I imme­di­ate­ly booked in for a Full Body MoleMap,” says Helena.

“When I arrived at the appoint­ment, I felt vul­ner­a­ble. I knew I would have to strip down to my under­wear and stand in var­i­ous posi­tions. How­ev­er, the ini­tial unease was short-lived, as the melanog­ra­ph­er made me feel very comfortable.

Patient Story Helena 3

“She explained exact­ly what she was going to do and asked if I had any moles that con­cerned me. I have a few moles that are much big­ger than the oth­ers, so I point­ed these out. As the ses­sion got under­way, she showed me what she was doc­u­ment­ing to relieve any ner­vous­ness I might have.

“What real­ly stood out for me was how thor­ough she was. She checked every­where — even places you wouldn’t think to look, like the scalp, between the toes and behind my ears.

“Even if you do an at-home skin check, there are places on the body you can’t see. These are the areas that fre­quent­ly get over­looked. Hav­ing a pro­fes­sion­al full body skin check is the best pro­tec­tion against skin can­cer, even if you con­sid­er your­self low risk.”

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Ongo­ing mon­i­tor­ing for peace of mind

“Dur­ing my skin check I had 39 lesions doc­u­ment­ed, which is quite a high num­ber. The pho­tographs of the sus­pect moles were sent to a der­ma­tol­o­gist to review. With­in about a week I received my results and was hap­py (and relieved) to find out every­thing was clear.

Patient Story Helena 4

“Even though I was real­ly pleased, I was mind­ful of the impor­tance of reg­u­lar skin checks. Now that I’ve had a Full Body MoleMap if I notice any changes I can book in for a free check in between appoint­ments. This is great for peace of mind.

“As part of the Full Body MoleMap ses­sion, I learned what I need to look out for with self-checks— such as changes in colour, shape or size. I also now realise that you need to look at parts of the body you might not think to check, par­tic­u­lar­ly the fin­ger­nails, toes and soles of the feet.

“Next month is my year­ly skin check. They will take new images and com­pare them with last year’s ones to iden­ti­fy any changes. Rather than feel­ing ner­vous about get­ting an annu­al skin check, I feel con­fi­dent I’m tak­ing the best action to pro­tect myself against skin cancer.

MoleMap Team

At MoleMap we check, detect and treat skin cancer. Find out how you can protect your skin at your nearest MoleMap skin cancer clinic.

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MoleMap specialises in skin cancer detection, diagnosis, proactive monitoring and treatment. Want the best protection against melanoma and other skin cancers? Get your skin and moles checked early and often at a MoleMap skin cancer clinic.