Hi,

I'm sorry you are having to have a suspicious mole removed. Hopefully it will be OK - if it's inflamed it might be more an infection in the skin under the mole but it's good to get it biopsied for a definate diagnosis.

If it is melanoma then you have caught it quickly & hopefully it's early stage (very shallow in depth under the skin) so it will be easily treatable - 95% of early stage melanoma patients never have any further problem.

As Celine says, every person's experience of dodgy looking moles is different - some dodgy moles can turn out to be dysplastic (atypical) moles that are benign but they like to remove them as they have the potential to turn cancerous in the future. My brother & his two children have had dysplastic moles removed whilst I'm a melanoma patient! So yours may not be cancerous but may be dysplastic. The good thing is that it is being removed speedily. I hope it's not cancerous but can I just suggest that, should it turn out to be melanoma, you see the GP you first saw & speak to them about it so that they know, for future reference, what a melanoma may look like (not all melanomas follow the ABCD pattern). Hopefully it will help them & their practice should another patient present with a similar problem (we melanoma patients like to help GPs this way, particularly as some may never see a patient in their practice with melanoma).

Good luck & please let us know how you get on,

Angie (Stage 3 melanoma patient)