Brian interviews OHC - Dr. Suzanne Partridge - UV Safety Month / Skin Cancer

Episode Transcript

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Hey, fifty five carec Detalk station. I'm going to consolidate our cares cares

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segments into one long one, andit's a really important one. Joining me
to talk about a UV safety Awarenessmonth, Ultraviolet rays and skin cancer.
Doctor Suzanne Partridge. She's one ofthe outstanding physicians at OHC, which happened
to be my cancer doctors. Aleading medical oncology and hematology expert who treats
melanoma and other forms of cancer.Uses advanced therapies to successfully treat payment patients

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with various forms of skin cancer,and her expertise has helped many patients overcome
their diagnosis and of healthy futures withbetter protection from the sun and other risk
factors. Welcome to the studio,doctor PARTRIDGS is a real pleasure having you
here today. Thank you, Brian. Yes, I mentioned to you I
just had my dermatology appointment. Ihave a standing appointment every six months.
I am a poster child for skincancer. Fair skin, Northern European descent,

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blue eyes, burned severely several times. I was a lifeguard. Nobody
use sent sunscreen back in the day. Even a couple of bouts of sun
poisoning where it feels like red antsare crawling over your body. So that
sets me up for a long termdown the road. Potential to have a
serious skin cancer, does it not? It can, but it's not just

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because you're not in that category.You should still be monitored. I've had
people in my office that don't havethat type of background in the past month,
even I've seen people that wouldn't bea typical risk factor. So it
should really go across to everybody.But if you're me at least in terms
of your background, you definitely wantto get a dermatology appointment. Correct,

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get one on the books, becauseit's going to take you a little while
to get one. They're in shortsupply and high demand. Yeah. And
also your primary care doctor they canscreen you as well, and sometimes if
they see something that's suspicious, theycan get you in faster, so you
don't necessarily have to wait for adermatologist. Fair enough, PCP, great
place to start. Let's start herein our conversation talking about the different types

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of skin cancer, what skin cancersare out there, because I've had some
grow removed, but so far Ihaven't gotten the diagnosis of the really bad
one. Yeah, So there's usuallyabout three. There's some rareer ones,
but we talk about basal cell aswell as squamas cells. Those are more
of the local skin cancers that usuallyjust need excision, not a lot of
other treatment needed. Usually as longas you don't wait too long, like

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freeze them off kind of thing corrector you cut them off. Sometimes you
need a special type of surgery.Melanoma is the one that can get more
serious and it can unfortunately invade intothe rest of our body. So that's
the one you got to really lookout for. And that's the metastasized problem.
You get it on your skin,but next thing you know, your
entire body is covered with cancer.But well before we get to prevention,

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what are you looking for when you'reself examining? You know what I mean.
You know, I've got a littlemole here, but I've had it
ever since I was a little kid. There's nothing to be seen, there's
nothing to bother with it. Butwhat of other things? What are we
supposed to be keeping our eyes outfor. Generally, you look for anything
that's changing, something that's bigger thanthe size of a pencil erase or how
or it can be smaller. Ifyou have something that's changing color, or

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you have various colors in that mole. I always tell people bleeding is not
something to ignore. Something that's changedrapidly would be something you would bring to
an attention. Okay, how aboutsomething that has like dimensional like it sticks
up like I think of a wartalmost but has a three dimensional component to
it. Is that something or isit? Question? Sometimes but not always.

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There's a lot of benign skin lesionsthat may be worrisome to people,
and I've spent a lot of mytime reassuring people. But you know,
how do you know? And that'swhat we're here for to help you differentiate
exactly. All right, what dowe do to prevent skin cancer? Well?
Number one from birth. Anytime we'reout in the sun, you definitely
got to be putting on sunscreen atleast an SPF of fifteen. Try to

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avoid times in the sun where it'sstrongest ten to four. But I know
that's a lot to ask. Hatsare important because a lot of us don't
cover our skins alps. And thenmy big thing outside of summer weather is
avoiding tanning beds. They're cancer machines, yes, and it really happens a
lot in teenage girls, and we'veseen unfortunate cases of twenty year olds getting

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melanoma that fans. It's completely tragic, and so I always try to I
know, it's beautiful to look tan. See. That's when we need to
change, is the mindset that that'sa stupid look, right, that we
should all transform our vision and say, all right, well, if you're
walking around with a real deep tanlike that, that means you're more like
to get skin cancer and you're gonnahave leather skin when you get older.

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Yeah, that all changed when tanningbecame popular back in the sixties and we
were all here hundreds of years ago, the fairness would be preferred. All
right, Well, let's move overto risk factors. Are there any risk
factors that make someone more susceptible toskin cancer other than a lot of exposure
to the sun. Definitely, wepay attention to family history. Certainly there's

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a family history of skin cancer,the radar goes up, and there can
be other cancers linked to melanoma,So you want to make sure you know
a family history of breast cancer,ovarian pancreatic cancer. Sometimes there's a link
there. Lomphoma not on the list, though, lymphoma generally no good.
So the personal into the disguision.I get my questions answered to, that's
all good, You're you're in theclear on that all right? Fair skin

(05:25):
with freckles, I see, yes, And again we go back to the
sunburns. I think mostly we've coveredwhat we really want to pay attention to.
Individuals at risk, specifically for melanima, more dangerous form of skin cancer
typically have what uh the fair skin, the blue eyes, yes, multiple

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sometimes people have more moles than others. And again if there's changing moles,
I think people that have a lotof moles on their bodies should definitely see
a dermatologist at least once or twicea year, just to make sure.
All right, it's I tell youwhat it really is. Peace of mind.
I mean, because you know,I go back to my father and
that was kind of the predicate forme wanting to get off my butt and
start paying closer attention. Was myfather spent so much time out in the

(06:13):
sun. He played baseball when he'sa little kid. He lived on the
golf course his whole life, andyou know, towards the end of his
last fifteen years of his life.He had so many things removed off his
face. Yes, and I dobelieve at one point he did have the
melanoma problem, so he scared me. We even have people that don't have
melanomas that have multiple squamas cells thatthe dermatologists can't even keep up with removing

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them. So those patients sometimes needto see us at HC because we have
systemic treatment to kind of cover thewhole base. But obviously, you know,
coming in for an IVY treatment everythree weeks is probably not as desirable
as being preventative. Well, goodto get ahead of it. Please,
all right now speaking the treatments OHC, of the folks to call if you
get a cancer diagnosis, do whatI did. It's eight eight eight six

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four nine eight hundred. You canlearn going onto the website. You can
learn more right now at ohcare dotcom. Hopefully don't tune out of the
balance of this because now we getto talk about the treatments that are available
at OHC foreskin cancer. So sometimeswe need a little bit more treatment than
surgery. So my role being ina medical oncologist, sometimes we have to
help patients prevent relapse or treat something. Unfortunately, that's already maybe too far

(07:21):
gone in terms of surgery. Soa lot of times these days we are
doing molecular profiling or tumor profiling tohelp figure out for that patient what's the
best option for them. Many MELANIUMApatients these days are going to get options
where the immune system are what wecall immune therapy is very effective for them.

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Well, that's great because that's agrowing area. Every time I talk
to OHC, there's another type ofcancer you are going after with this particular
protocol. Definitely, And I callmyself a mid career doctor now. Back
twenty years ago, when I wasfinishing training or fifteen, I should say,
you remember offering patients treatments that werefive percent benefit and that very that

(08:05):
was very unsatisfying and very difficult.And when you turn something into now a
sixty or seventy percent benefit and I'mactually seeing people survive this, that's been
a really outstanding, at least personally, to see people improve and actually we
impact them now and I only seeit getting better. You have the right
to have hope when you got thatkind of percentage right, correct, And

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I can't even tell you the numberof people that are here today because of
these treatments that would not have beenhere fifteen years ago. And I have
people in my office that are fiveand ten year survivors that wouldn't have been
with us twenty years ago. Forsure, in a six month period,
well, an untreated melanoma, howaggressive is that before we part company here
today? I mean, if youhave to act with some urgency correct,

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well, I mean I think itdepends on where you find it. Some
not to scare people, because ifyou catch a millanium really easy early,
you're going to do very well,ninety percent chance of being cured. It's
when it gets into the lymph nodesthat your high risk to relapse and if
it spreads to other organs, ifit comes back, if you didn't treat
it, your prognosis is generally undersix months to a year. So when

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we're impacting people to live in longterm emissions for years, that was not
something we had the eyesight of fifteentwenty years ago, and it's just been
an amazing thing to witness. Butit's still not enough. We still have
people that don't do well, andso we still need to move forward.

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We still need to push the buttonhigher. Why Ohc's there doing all the
clinical trials and being on the cuttingedge of cancer therapies. There is hope
and it's at OHC. I gottons of hope from OHC when I was
getting treated. Ohcare dot coms whereyou find them online. Doctor Suzanne Partridge
may be your physician if you're dealingwith these issues involving skin cancer. One
of the just the great doctors thereamong many the number eight eight eight sixty

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four nine forty eight hundred eight eighteight sixty four nine forty eight hundred,
Doctor Partridge. Keep up the greatwork and thanks for the wonderful information you
passed along to my listeners today.We appreciate b GOHD the community, my
pleasure having you on to spread theword. Brigha mcgow was in studio from
the Hudson Institute talking about the ChevronScotus decision earlier. Get the podcast