If there’s one thing you need to do before this summer… it’s get your nekked bod checked by a dermo. Kendra Coppey of Barefoot Tiger hooks you up with details you do and do not want to know!
There’s nothing worse than sitting in a Doctor’s office wearing a piece of paper, having some dude scan your body top to bottom, and then shelling out your co-pay on your way out the door. Cheap exhibitionist thrill? Nope, Dr. Dermatologist yearly skin check. May is National Skin Cancer Awareness Month and this very important start to your summer just got a little easier; there are *free* skin checks, all over the country throughout the summer! In case you think you don’t need to get your skin checked, here are a few sobering facts (from skincancer.org):
- Skin cancer is the most common form of cancer in the United States. More than one million skin cancers are diagnosed annually.
- Each year there are more new cases of skin cancer than the combined incidence of cancers of the breast, prostate, lung and colon.
- Basal cell carcinoma (BCC) is the most common form of skin cancer; about one million of the cases diagnosed annually are basal cell carcinomas.29 Basal cell carcinomas are rarely fatal, but can be highly disfiguring.
- One in five Americans will develop skin cancer in the course of a lifetime.
- Between 40 and 50 percent of Americans who live to age 65 will have either skin cancer at least once.
- In 2004, the total direct cost associated with the treatment for non-melanoma skin cancers was more than $1 billion.
- Contrary to popular belief, 80 percent of a person’s lifetime sun exposure is not acquired before age 18; only about 23 percent of lifetime exposure occurs by age 18. Lifetime UV Exposure in the United States Ages Average Accumulated Exposure* 1-18 22.73 percent19-40 46.53 percent41-59 73.7 percent60-78 100 percent: Based on a 78 year lifespan.
- Melanoma accounts for about three percent of skin cancer cases, but it causes more than 75 percent of skin cancer deaths.
- Survival with melanoma increased from 49 percent between 1950 and 1954 to 92 percent between 1996 and 2003.
- The survival rate for patients whose melanoma is detected early, before the tumor has penetrated the epidermis, is about 99 percent. The survival rate falls to 15 percent for those with advanced disease.
- One blistering sunburn in childhood or adolescence more than doubles a person’s chances of developing melanoma later in life.
- A person’s risk for melanoma doubles if he or she has had five or more sunburns at any age.
Now get your butt to the screening center, bring a friend, and GET CHECKED THIS MONTH! You could save your life. Find free skin cancer screening listings in NYC near you here. Sign up for an e-alert for a screening near you. Or find the mobile RV coming to your hood soon.
Kendra Coppey is an advocate for Skin Cancer Prevention and the Founder of Barefoot Tiger (www.barefoottiger.com), an in-home personal training, yoga, nutrition and massage therapy company in New York, New Jersey and coming soon to Philadelphia. She is a certified yoga teacher, personal trainer and nutrition coach, and is infatuated with all things sweet…including her two rescued kitties Emma and Sabrina!