11 March 2015

Crap. Crap. Crap. [Updated]

(Warning: biopsy image below)

I was, no exaggeration, no more than one toe away from being done with my annual strip-for-it full-body skin-cancer screening today when my PA found this on my left Greek toe.

What the heck?

Gosh dang it.

She's good.  I've had at least a half-dozen basal-cell carcinomas removed over the years, and I've become rather adept at identifying them.  But I'd never seen this spot before.  Wasn't there last time I trimmed my toenails, far as I can recollect, and that was just about a week ago, before the snows came.

Hate to ski with long toenails.

biopsy 15x macro

Anyways, the biopsy's off to the lab... five to seven days, I'll have my answer.  Though I'm pretty sure I already know what it is.

Looks like melanoma to me.

Really?

How does that happen on your toe?



[Update: 13 March 2015] After 48 hours of fretting, several members of our faculty insisted today that I contact my dermatologist's office and ask for my lab results, "It's Friday," they insisted.  "You call them.  Right now."  So I did.  

A pleasant RN named Jennifer returned my call about an hour later.

"It's benign," she told me.  I asked her to repeat it.  

"Benign."

Best. News. Ever.




May your trails be crooked, winding, lonesome, dangerous, leading to the most amazing view. -- Ed Abbey