New Diagnosis

Hi Bb123 and welcome. I hope you find the forum useful and I'm sure someone with more to offer will reply to you soon. One thing that comes up over and over again is that it is rarely helpful to search the internet for answers. More often than not it just gives cause for more concern. Your condition and treatment is unique to you and reading all the subject matter can be counter productive. A lot of us on here have fallen into that trap. I hope everything works out well for you and keep in touch via the forum.

hello BB123, I think prognosis info might be quite out of date due to the preventative or adjuvant treatment that people can now have which will be a game changer for some people i would have thought. to get through the WLE and SLNB it will help others to know what area on the body, as coping can vary a lot from necks, arms and groin. I had an unknown primary so cant help with personal experience but there are lots here who can.

Hi Bb123

I'm sorry to read that you've recently been diagnosed with melanoma and I know how scary it can be having been diagnosed myself 5 years ago. I've been waiting to see if you followed KTatHome's suggestion of letting us know what area of the body your melanoma was before replying but don't want to hold off any longer and the following is my experience.

Either the day of your operation, or in my case the day before, you'll go to your hospital and have a radioactive dye injected as close to the site where the melanoma was as possible. This dye then flows to the sentinel lymph node and the surgeon can then see which node needs removing. Depending on where your melanoma was it could go to more than one node. Mine was on my arm so my SLNB was in my armpit.

Later that day or the next day you'll then have both the WLE and SLNB done under local anaesthetic. The WLE is similar to your original excisional biopsy except a larger area all around the original site is taken away to make sure that clear margins around your original melanoma are achieved. The SLN and WLE are then sent off to be biopsied. Just like when you had your biopsy ask how long it should be before you get your results and how you'll get them.

You'll probably need to take painkillers for a few days after the operations depending on where they were performed but all this information will be given to you, along with how to look after the wounds, etc, when you go for your pre-op.

I hope this helps a little and if you want to ask me anything please feel free.

It would be great if you could pop something about your diagnosis and treatment into your profile as it really helps others when replying to you and also when looking for someone on a similar pathway. It also means that you don't have to keep repeating yourself. To do this click on your username and then select 'Profile'. You can amend it at any time and if you're not sure what to write you can take a look at mine by clicking on my username.

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Hi Bb123, sorry to hear about your diagnosis, my daughter 16 has also just been diagnosed with a SSM (stage 1b). She is having her op (WLE & SNLB) next week. At any age a mm is a horrible shock, but being so young I understand it must be really tough, as odds are so rare and you just want to get on with everyday things.

Good luck with your op, I am keeping everything crossed for you. I hope you can get this period over with, recover and in no time you will be at uni having a great time. I have a son who has just gone to uni and student services are always a great place to get support if you need anything or have worries.

You and my daughter will now be much more informed and anything at all suspicions on your skin in the future will be seen early.

Once the op is done something you might want to talk to the doctors about is genetic testing. The hospital based on my daughters age and family history are giving us the option of a blood test to see if she has certain genes. The theory being if she does, she will be very closely monitored/scanned. We are considering it, but will decide post SNLB as at the moment there is too much anxiety over that.

Take care and good luck.

Andrea