Taking good care of your skin pays dividends when it comes to your appearance. Yet theres far more to being proactive than meets the eye. As skin is the bodys largest organ, taking care of it is also vital to maintaining your overall health.

In our sunny climate, the risk of developing skin cancer is compounded. First rule of thumb is to have a yearly skin check performed by an experienced dermatologist. That red, scaly bump youve been ignoring just might be a precancerous lesion. Chances are its a basal or squamous cell skin cancer the two most common types but anything new, changing, or unusual on both sun-exposed and sun-protected areas of the body is worth investigating. It could be melanoma.

Fortunately, the days when melanoma was the equivalent of a death sentence are behind us. Dr. Timothy Jochen of Contour Dermatology, with offices in Palm Springs, Rancho Mirage and La Quinta, points to the progress being made with a game-changing form of cancer tissue testing.

Were starting to do gene expression profile testing where we can identify people who are most at risk for recurrence of melanoma as well as those who are at more risk for metastases. Jochen also underlines the advances being made with anti-program death receptor inhibitors, an injectable form of immunotherapy.

Melanoma, like most cancers, is skilled at hiding from the bodys immune system. What anti-program death receptor inhibitors have been able to do is turn the immune system back on, so your body will actually go and fight the melanoma where it went incognito before, says Jochen, emphasizing that these are very exciting times for dermatology.

Meanwhile, basal and squamous cell varieties of skin cancer are eminently treatable. Methods run the gamut from medicated creams to Mohs surgery, which offers the highest cure rate for difficult-to-treat and/or invasive cases. More recently, Contour Dermatology and other dermatology practices are finding great success employing multiple low-radiation treatments as an alternative to surgery.

New and improved treatment methods have emerged to treat other common skin conditions that vex people as well. For instance, inflammatory skin disorders such as eczema and psoriasis are benefiting from immune modulator treatments. When topical therapies fail, we can move on to these oral or injectable medications that can actually control these disorders if you have a severe disease process, Jochen explains.

Excerpt from:

Taking Care of Your Skin Now Will Pay Off in the Future - Palm Springs Life