Moles that are harmless don't tend to change much over time. Arbesman says this last letter may be the most helpful one for patients to remember, and it's also the most intuitive, because it just involves asking yourself: does this area of my skin look different than it used to? Foto: Crystal Cox/InsiderĮ is for evolving. Moles that are 6 millimeters wide or larger may merit a closer look. Again, this doesn't necessarily mean bigger moles are definitely cancerous, and smaller moles aren't, but if a mole is bigger, there are more melanocytes present, which may be an indication melanoma is spreading there. The diameter of most benign moles is smaller than 6 millimeters (that's about the size of a pencil eraser). A dot on my skin was both brown and red, but when Chen asked a dermatologist about that, they said it was simply a "collision lesion" with "favorable features" meaning two benign moles that were different colors were stuck together.ĭ is for diameter. If there's black and brown and blue all mixed into the same growth, that can be a red flag. The color of regular moles should be uniform. The borders of benign (that is, the harmless, non-cancerous) moles should be well-defined, not hazy or fuzzy (which, again, may be an indication the mole is growing or changing.) But a normal mole border for you may look different from someone else's.Ĭ is for color. But everyone's skin is a little different, and not every mole needs to be perfect.ī is for borders. If a spot on your skin is misshapen, it may need to get checked out. Because of the way cancer evolves, one tell-tale sign of a cancerous growth may be asymmetry. Here's how to use the letters when you're monitoring your own skin:Ī is for asymmetry. Chen taught me the well-known A-B-C-D-E trick for skin scanning, a shortcut for helping decide which moles and growths may merit further study.
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