Welcome to the forum Stu although I'm so sorry to hear you may have to wait 24 weeks to have your mole looked at, despite the referral being urgent.

Hopefully some of our members who have found themselves in a similar position will be along soon to offer their thoughts and advice but if you'd like to discuss this further with one of our cancer nurses, you can do so on 0808 800 4040, Monday - Friday between 9a.m - 5p.m. 

We're thinking of you Stu and will have our fingers crossed you are able to seen sooner, and that your mole is no cause for concern.

Kind regards,

Steph, Cancer Chat Moderator

Hey how are you, did you get an appointment date?

Hi, no I still haven’t got one through. The mole fortunately hasn’t changed in this time, but still a worry. When I call, NHS just keep saying they are really sorry but that waiting times are bad at the moment and they can’t give me a time. it’s not very comforting. 

I’m so sorry to hear this. I am going through the same process. 
I was referred under urgent, I was seen and had teledermatology photos done which was sent to a consultant, I had a letter written to me by the consultant to say she’s directly booked me for surgery and biopsy. Still awaiting results. 
this whole process has been going on since (9th of February) it’s now may, and it’s still not over. I still don’t know if I have skin cancer or not. 
what I’m getting at is that unfortunately there does seem to be a very long wait. I was told that the biopsies are happening through clinical urgency. There seems to be no reassurance from professionals either. Seems very cruel to tell people they might have cancer and then they are literally just left to sit with that on their minds on a long waiting list 

Hi,

I'm aghast that it's a 24 week wait to be seen & also the same with a private dermatologist. I know that some parts of the country have worse waiting times but that's the worst I've heard of. I don't know where you live but would you be able to travel to another part of the country if you could find a private dermatologist with a shorter waiting list (it's harder to be referred to an NHS hospital in another county or country ie. from Scotland to England etc).

Angie (Stage 3 melanoma patient since 2009)

I live in Aberdeen and have tried all private clinics in the area. I tried one near Glasgow and they were the same and also said the waiting times for skin cancer checks are really long. I would feel a bit better if they had done the biopsy and it was a longer wait. 24 weeks even for a biopsy result would be long, but I haven’t even got that far as yet so it feels a significant amount of time. 

reading online about how quickly things can go from bad to worse isn’t helping and I’m keeping an eye on it weekly, but even if I noticed a change I’m not sure it would improve the waiting time. 

Stu, I've sent you a friend request. If you accept it we can chat further about this by pm.