Hi everyone,
I wanted to post here to share my mum's current experience as I hope it can help someone (reading this forum has been been a great help to me).
My mum had a small odd looking mole (ugly duckling) just above her ankle. I first noticed it in March 2021 and urged her to keep an eye on it. I continued to bug her and when it really started to change and evolve in late May she booked an appointment to have it screened at Boots (this happened on 25/06). The next morning she was called by ScreenCancer urging her to book an appointment with her GP ASAP as it was highly suspicious on melanoma. Finding this out was a blow.
My mum contacted her GP for an urgent appointment and an urgent referral was made to the dermatologist on 28/06. The wait for the next appointment seemed long, constantly checking if she had had any phone calls or letters. She was called by the hospital and an appointment was made for 17/07.
She was seen on a Saturday by a private GP who was helping with the volume of appointments. He checked my mum over and also checked her lymph nodes, and advised that the mole needed to be removed. Luckily my mum had her mole removed on the same day. She returned a couple of hours later and had the mole removed by a plastic surgeon.
The consultant advised that he would mark it as urgent and to expect results to take 2-3 weeks. On Friday, nearly 5 weeks after being seen my mum received a call asking her to attend an appointment today (23/08), if she hasn't taken this appointment the next was 27/09!
Today my mum found out she has stage 1B melanoma (0.95mm). They are confident it has all been removed, however she will have a WLE and lymph node check in the next few weeks.
Although it's hard news to hear, we are positive and prognosis looks good. I am pleased she went to Boots to have the mole check and everything has actually been pretty quick despite COVID.
As I said, I just wanted to share my mum's current experience to help those going through the same. This forum has really been a great help to me when trying not to Google worst case scenarios.
Before all of this I didn't know much about Melanoma but I will be educating myself and everyone I know going forwards.
Thank you :happy:
