Physicians and Education are the Key to early Melanoma Detection

If Melanoma is caught early enough, it can be cured, but in later stages is deadly. At Super Bowl time this year, Bruce Springsteen made note of the disease after losing a long time member of the E Street Band and created the Danny Fund.

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - Among middle-age and older men, physician-detected invasive melanomas tend to be thinner than those discovered by patients or their domestic partners.

"Public education, in particular targeting less-educated, middle-aged and older men for improved self-examination and physician skin surveillance should become an integral component of skin cancer risk reduction strategies promoted by cancer advocacy organizations," write Dr. Susan M. Swetter, at Stanford University Medical Center, California, and co-investigators.

The authors found that "thinner tumors were associated with (1) physician detection, (2) a higher melanoma awareness and certain health preventive attitudes, (3) a higher level of education, and (4) the presence of atypical nevi (moles)."

In addition to targeted public education, the researchers recommend that medical schools and primary care residency programs "consider intensive efforts to teach the skin cancer examination."