Introducing the Disease Class

Malinformed about melanoma? Then you might want to keep reading. In the first unit of the class called "Disease", we studied about physical diseases that affect the human body. Diabetes, cancer, and many others were chosen in this free of choice Action Project, which centered around body affecting ailments (also known as: Physical diseases). A challenge for me was finding someone to interview who either is a survivor or a patient of skin cancer (or any variation of it). It was difficult to find someone, and harder to contact, so as an alternative, I used true stories from SkinCancer.org, specifically this page: http://www.skincancer.org/true-stories. I was proud of my visual which you will see in the full report below due to ti being completely digital using Google Drive's Drawing application, which is available as a preset under "more" option when making a new file. In short, alongside Jerry Penacoli's survivor story of melanoma, I speak of the traits, factors, risks, and treatments of skin cancer in general.

Cancer, the abnormal growth of cells in a particular area. Melanoma is a serious type of skin cancer that Jerry Penacoli, host of the Nightly Entertainment show, managed to get through himself. He noticed a brown freckle on his inner thigh that wasn’t there before, and overnight, it drastically expanded and he then knew this wasn’t natural. When he went to get this checked out, he was diagnosed with Melanoma, and was put into a surgical operation 4 days after this. 2 surgeries were in order, one to remove the cancerous growth, and another to remove 22 lymph nodes because the cancer could have spread to them.

VG, The Human Body, 2015

Skin cancer is caused from a multitude of reasons, one being over exposure to sunlight. Now when most people think of skin cancer, they won’t think that it affects the largest organ in the body, but the integumentary system; which is also known as our skin, is indeed an organ. Lymph nodes distribute white blood cells throughout the lymphatic system, and those white blood cells fight off viruses, however they may get infected by diseases such as cancer. Skin cancer really happens wherever the sun can shine and it happens to anyone of all races and genders. While anyone is at risk, lighter skinned people are more vulnerable because of their sensitivity to the harsh sun, but there is no increase or decrease in risk based on age or gender, merely exposure to a large amount of sunlight (a very large amount). This doesn't go to say you should stay out of the sun because vitamin D is an essential vitamin, this only means you should moderate your body from the sun, or even artificial UV rays such as tanning beds.

A precaution to be sure of in regards to skin cancer is to look for new, unnatural looking growths that may seem like birthmarks at first glance. In a single night, these newly found marks will grow and become more dangerous as they expand and spread. Different types of UV rays affect your skin as well, with UVA aging the skin much faster, and UVB basically burning your skin. Luckily enough, cancer is not contagious in any way whatsoever, so it’s easy to prevent, yet it is tough to combat. As most other cancers, skin cancer has multiple stages, and with each number growing tells how serious, dangerous, or large it may be. Treatments to cancers like melanoma include removing the tumour and anything that may have been contaminated or affected by it. Skin cancer is no doubt one of the worst diseases, starting out as something easily disregardable and possibly growing in a practically invisible spot of the body.