Ryan Glassop from Australia had an unusual mole on his nape but what he didn’t realize was that it would change his life forever.
When the 37-year-old father noticed the mole on the back of his neck, he did not think too much about it until someone told him to have it checked.
Ryan then had the spot checked at his place of work after a friend passed away from skin cancer, and the decision to do so saved his life.
It turned out that the spot on Ryan’s back was a nevus spilus. It does not always become cancer but for Ryan, it did.
People may think that simply removing the spot would be enough but what he went through was way more than that.
Ryan endured 40 biopsies and aggressive surgery as doctors couldn’t get a clean boundary around the affected area during the problem.
After the fourth surgery, doctors took skin measuring 40cm long and 8cm wide from his legs and applied it on his back and neck.
The father-of-two described his experience as ‘quite scary’ and it had been ‘life-changing.’
In an interview with Yahoo News Australia, he said: “Going through that was scary at first, but then once they said ‘if we can get this skin graft done, we think you’ll be in the clear’, it was more dealing with the fact I’d have fairly significant scars.”
Ryan and his wife are now on a mission to tell their story to create awareness for others who may be unaware of the possible dangers that may be waiting for them.
“It’s a common perception that melanoma, although can be deadly, can be removed pretty easily and there’s only a small scar,” he said.
“It’s been life-changing as you’d expect.”
His wife also took to Facebook to spread the word. “The thing is, with any skin cancer, not only do they remove the affected area of skin, but they also take a boundary around it.
“Ryan’s boundaries kept coming back abnormal, which was then found to be a skin condition called Nevus Spillus. It’s very rare for it to transition into melanoma, but in his case it did.”
Both their children are being screened to evaluate the risk of them getting skin cancer in the future.
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