Protecting your skin in the sun is a message that has become universal. However, apart from the hours spent on a beach towel in full sun, sun protection is not a reflex that we have on a daily basis, as soon as we put our noses outside. A forgetfulness that is not trivial: it increases the risk of catching a melanoma, “as much if we lack protection since childhood. You think that the subject only concerns the inhabitants of the south of France? You are wrong.
Brittany, where the shelves are the most dangerous
Northernly accused of being immersed in greyness, the region most exposed to skin cancers in France turns out to be … Brittany! And not just a little … three times more cases of skin cancer than the national average are listed. But why this difference?
Two reasons are mentioned by dermatologists. On the one hand, people regularly lack vigilance due to the scarcity of the sun in this region. On the other hand, the heat being felt less, it does not invite to protect itself in an emergency. “Yet Brittany receives as many ultraviolets as the southern France but by weather conditions, the winds … The feeling of heat is less. False, you can believe you are sheltered but it is only an illusion”explains Doctor Marc Perrussel, dermatologist and cancerologist at the Rennes University Hospital in the daily Ouest-France. A region so affected that a specific campaign, called alert Breizh, was born to recall the right gestures.
Protect yourself from the sun, (in Brittany or elsewhere) instructions for use
Also remember that the sunscreen, even with a high index, is not enough to protect itself. Even with an index 50, it does not filter 100 % of UV, and its use alone does not effectively protect. Faced with summer sun, here are the good gestures to adopt:
- Avoid exposure between 12 p.m. and 4 p.m.when the radiation is strongest;
- Wearing covering clothes, a wide -edge hat and sunglasses with UV filter;
- Seek Permanently, even when the sky is veiled;
- Generously apply a sunscreenadapted to its skin type every two hours.
Tanning, on the other hand, is not protection either and does not exempt you from protecting yourself. On the contrary, he indicates that the skin has been attacked. “”Tanned skin indicates that DNA has suffered damage “recalls the Inca. Beyond the risk of cancer, it is also a skin aging accelerator.
The signs that must make you consult
Fear of melanoma? On this point know that only a dermatologist knows how to distinguish benign forms of beauty grains from cancer forms. However, some symptoms can be evocative reminded us of Professor Caroline Robert in a previous article.
This easy to remember rule can help recognize melanoma. It consists in inspecting her skin and her grains of beauty by observing the following 5 points
A: as asymmetrical
That is to say that one side does not look like the other.
B: as borders
The borders of the beauty grain can be irregular, blurred and poorly delimited.
C: as a color
You have noticed a change in its color (it can be darker than before: black, blue, brown or even becoming red or depigmented).
D: as a diameter
The diameter of a mole that has changed can be a warning sign. The most common beauty grains are less than 6 mm. There are more imposing without it representing a danger. On the other hand, you must be more vigilant if this diameter varies and increases.
E: as evolution
If you notice a rapid evolution of your beauty grains (in a few weeks, months or years), it is important to consult your dermatologist. “I recommend that my patients photograph their beauty grains (iskinfree application on iPhone and Android)offers the expert. There is no need to do it often, but if each person at risk had photos of their body, this would help a lot to the diagnosis of melanoma by confirming their evolutionary character ” advised our expert.