A new mole on the leg, did not itch

This mole had been growing and changing for a few years, and there was no other mole on the patient’s skin. This should have sounded warning bells, but she wasn’t worried because it didn’t itch. And itching is an important feature of skin cancer, isn’t it? NO IT ISN’T. I have been working in this field for 20 years and learned from many of the world’s best experts, attending their lectures, reading their books, even sitting in on some of their clinics. Melanomas DO NOT as a rule itch. It’s what they look like that worries us, not what they feel like. Many people also assume that skin cancers are painful. They aren’t (with the exception of a proportion of some squamous cell cancers, but they are easy to diagnose as they grow so fast).

Here is the ‘mole’ as presented to the doctor, several years after it…