Quick Links
The best way of avoiding disease is by safeguarding against it and sun protection is a cornerstone of skin cancer prevention.
Prevention Overview
When the immune system in your skin is working at 100 percent efficiency, it clears away borderline precancerous areas. This prevents them from turning into growths that you can feel or see. Ultraviolet light from the sun’s rays, however, temporarily suppresses the immune system in your skin. When you expose your skin to the sun without protection, you hinder your immune system’s natural ability to clear away small clusters of precancerous skin cells and, consequently, prevent skin cancer like squamous cell carcinoma, basal cell carcinoma, melanoma, and other growths. Whether you’re burning or tanning, you are increasing your risk of precancerous growths turning into skin cancer.
Skin cancer statistics show that sun protection during every season is paramount for skin cancer protection. Some people have the misconception that because they tan easily and don’t experience bad sunburn, they don’t have to worry about skin cancers. It’s true that they may not be at high risk, but they are still at risk, nonetheless.
Remember, there is no safe tan. Tanning or using tanning beds prior to vacations does not protect your skin.
What You Can Do
It’s never too late to start protecting your skin. Just because you haven’t in the past, doesn’t mean your skin won’t benefit from skin cancer prevention now. Trillium Creek Dermatology offers sun protection products to safeguard your skin from the sun, and sunless tanning products for a safe, natural-looking alternative to sun exposure to our patients.
Applying an SPF (sun protection factor) of 50 or greater with antioxidants and nutrients should be a daily ritual to stop UVA and UVB rays from damaging your skin. You’ll also want to wear sun-protective clothing with a UPF (ultraviolet protection factor) rating.
After undergoing skin cancer treatment or surgery, or if you have a history of skin cancer, it becomes especially important to consider the benefits of applying broad-spectrum sunscreen products. We are serving the following communities and those surrounding: Wooster, Wadsworth, Medina, Brunswick, Strongsville, and Hinkley.