The message might be boring but the outcome is not!
Ultraviolet radiation – Sun – damage is cumulative. The more you get the more damage is likely to occur. There is significant damage done after a day at the beach and a bad sunburn – in fact statistics show that one bad sunburn doubles your life risk of melanoma. We often forget that problems also arise with regular small amounts of exposure.
One of the common areas I remove skin cancers from is the back of hands and the right side of the face.
“But I never go in the Sun Doctor!” I am often emphatically told.
“Did you drive here?” I would ask. “Have you driven to work each day for the past 20 years?” There was usually a nod of the head in acknowledgment
“Well the sun shines on your hands and the window side of your face. Those areas have had a lot more exposure and are paying the price.”
Regular sun exposure to one area leads to local areas of premature ageing, wrinkles, redness, scaling and often skin cancers.
When I first came to this now obvious realisation I decided to put sunblock on myself before driving into the office each day. Many days I would forget and remember as I looked at the back of my hands on the steering wheel.
So I decided to work out a way not to forget. I taped the sunblock and the toothpaste tube together. My teeth never got missed so putting on the sunblock on my hands followed naturally.
And for the trip home I have a second tube of sunblock under the dash in the car!
I would be interested to hear how others have solved the memory dillema and manage to block out when needed. Summer is here. Time to get sun smart.
