April/May 2015 59 FROM TOP: SHUTTERSTOCK; COURTESY OF PALO ALTO MEDICAL FOUNDATION survey contained the first sign that teen indoor tanning rates may be falling. Previous surveys showed that nearly one out of every three young white women, a group at high risk for eventually developing skin cancer, engaged in indoor tanning. But the numbers are still high enough to be worrying, since there’s been increasing legislation banning minors from tanning and laws reclassifying sunlamps as higherrisk devices. “Usually by the time you reach 30 or 40, you realize you’re not immortal,” says Noodleman. “But the damage is done mostly in the teenage years.” Butler agrees. “I have a lot of 40-yearolds who did indoor tanning,” she says of her patients. “They’re coming in with tons of pre-cancer and cancer, and aging signs such as wrinkles and brown spots.” But, Butler adds, the irony is that “people still want to look tan. Now they have these brown spots and want to cover them up with tans, but tanning is what caused the brown spots to begin with.” While the numbers are troubling, experts express hope for the future. “Tanning has been a cultural thing,” says Ko. “But now when I go to the playground with my child, I see people wearing longsleeved shirts. There is change happening like it did with smoking. But that took a few decades.” In the meantime, the best approach is active prevention and diagnosis. “Skin cancer is a really easily screened disease,” says Singhal. “You don’t need an X-ray or a blood test. You just need to walk into a dermatologist’s office. The upside is so up and the downside is so down.” n 1970–1979 1980–1989 1990–1999 2000–2009 “Genetics tends to play more of a risk factor in melanoma; it’s a little more complex.” — d r . s u s a n b u t l e r f i r s t - t i m e m e l a n o m a f o r y o u n g a d u l t s A 2012 Mayo Clinic study found that first-time diagnosis of melanoma— the more rare but deadlier form of skin cancer—had increased eightfold among women ages 18 to 39 in the past four decades and fourfold among young men. 37 92 47 20 30 14 10 6 NUMBER OF MALES IN STUDY NUMBER OF FEMALES IN STUDY
South Bay Accent - Apr/May 2015
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