A skin cancer diagnosis in someone who loves living in the sun may not come as a complete shock to Jimmy Buffett fans. But as many Parrotheads learned posthumously, the type of cancer he was diagnosed with was Merkel cell carcinoma, one of the rarest types of cancer. He is also more aggressive.
“Merkel cell carcinoma is probably the fourth most common skin cancer that we think of,” said Dr. Vishal Patel, associate professor of dermatology and oncology at George Washington University School of Medicine.
“This skin cancer is very rare, rarely seen and more aggressive,” Patel said. “Some consider it to be a very aggressive skin cancer, which means that the mortality rate for people with this skin cancer is high.”
Cancer cells are usually found on the surface of the skin. But Merkel cells are more specialized cells, they participate in the nervous distribution of sensory organs and the skin. He said that when it turns into cancer, it is different from other types of skin cancer.
“Merkel cells may be the color of your skin. It can look like a lot of blood vessels, like blue and red blood vessels,” Patel said. It looks like something. It's not like "a certain" skin cancer. »
Merkel cell skin cancer tends to occur in older patients. While most cases are linked to excessive exposure to the sun, “there are also types of cancer caused by viral infections. And these patients tend to have good outcomes and respond better to treatment,” Patel said.
She says to always use sunscreen with an SPF of 30 or higher and reapply it to your skin diligently. Using SPF 50 instead of 30 doesn't mean you can go longer between applications. And even after that, it's still important to pay attention to your body, she says.
“I tell patients if you have something new, it looks different, you don't remember it, it's not like your other spots, that's what you need to investigate,” Patel said. But Merkel's cell phone can be a little difficult to track.
Learn more about Merkel cell carcinoma on the Mayo Clinic website.
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