Page 23 - Tropic Magazine Issue 31

TROPIC • HEALTH

Skin cancer types

Most people have heard about melanoma,
which is one of three types of skin cancer,
and the deadliest as well. Melanoma is
basically a tumour that develops in the
pigment cells of our skin, the melanocytes.
It is caused by ultraviolet (UV) light.
The majority of our UV exposure comes
from the sun and the outdoor lifestyle that
most Australians enjoy.
When it comes to skin cancer, there is
more than ‘just’ melanoma. The other two
types are basal cell carcinoma (BCC) and
squamous cell carcinoma (SSC).
Even though these types of cancer are
less likely to be deadly, they can impact
the quality of our lives.
The non-melanoma skin cancers, BCC
and SCC, can be quite disfiguring because
people often need to have them cut out.
Some people develop ten or twenty of
these each year from middle age onwards.

As part of a long-term study, Dr Harrison
tested these uniforms with more than
500 children aged one to six years in
daycare centres in Townsville. “It was
clear that the children who were wearing
our daycare uniform developed fewer
moles than kids that wore their own
clothes to childcare,” she said, adding that
less moles generally suggest a smaller risk
of melanoma (the most aggressive form
of skin cancer) in later life.
For health professionals who are
interested in getting into skin cancer
research, Dr Harrison suggests that
JCU’s Master of Public Health is well
worth considering. “It provides the
foundations that are required in
epidemiology, biostatistics and project
planning,” she said. JCU’s Master of
Public Health can be studied online, with MORE: jcu.edu.au/courses
start dates in both February and July.

23 • tropicnow.com.au