Unneeded Skin Lesion Removals in 90% of Melanoma Patients

A new report in the Journal of the American Academy of Dermatology1 claims that 90 percent of melanoma patients may not only have had their skin lesions removed unnecessarily, but may also have actually increased their morbidity risk by doing so.

The study looked at 300,215 melanoma excision cases that occurred over 10 years at participating clinics and dermatopathology units in 13 countries.

As reported by The Tanning Blog:2

The purpose of the survey was to investigate the relationship between necessary excision of malignant melanoma and unnecessary removals of benign lesions. In non-specialized clinics the number of unnecessary removals was as much as 30 times higher than the necessary excisions. In specialized clinics, the ratio sank to less than 10 times.

This means that in some dermatologists' clinics, 90 out of 100 'melanoma-victims' were misled to have a piece of their skin sliced away. When extrapolating the average figures in the survey to one million American victims, as many as 900,000 may have suffered needlessly.

Read more here: http://gaia-health.com