Woman’s sun-bed addition leads to face cancer

A mother of two has opened up about her horror addiction to sunbeds, and how her dangerous habit left her with a gaping hole in her face.

Carrie Doles, of Illinois in the US, said she had been using sunbeds since she was in college, never thinking twice about her daily tanning sessions.

Speaking to WFLD, Mrs Doles said tanning was part of her beauty ritual, not understanding the consequences sun-bed usage had on her skin.

“It became an addiction. If I missed a day I would become depressed,” Doles told the station, adding that many of her friends also used tanning beds.

“It was euphoric. I guess you could say I was on a high after I had my tan. We all did it. We would all go together.”

Following graduation from college, Mrs Doles started to notice the signs of her tanning habit. A small spot on her leg was a form of skin cancer, which had to be removed.

Following medical appointments, experts asked Mrs Doles to stop using the beds — but she ignored their advice.

“I didn’t heed his warning,” she said. “I didn’t think it was that big of a deal so I continued to tan after that.”

At 26, Mrs Doles found a small spot on her face but ignored it. Eventually, she saw a doctor who said the small lesion on her face was cancer that had been rapidly spreading under her skin.

“I heard them cutting into my skin,” she said.

“When I was done, when they finally said that the cancer cells were removed, I was left with a huge hole in the side of my face.”

In Australia, approximately two in three Australians will be diagnosed with skin cancer by the time they are 70, with more than 750,000 people treated for one or more non-melanoma skin cancers in Australia each year.

Melanoma is the third most common cancer in Australians. In 2014, 13,134 Australians were diagnosed with melanoma and these are a major cause of mortality from cancer, particularly in young adults.

In Australia, while it is legal to own a solarium for personal use, since 2016 it has been illegal for tanning beds to be used anywhere that charges a fee.

The laws came into effect in New South Wales, Victoria, Tasmania, ACT and Queensland IN 2015.

Western Australia became the last state to implement a ban on commercial tanning beds, introducing the ban from January 1 2016, and has offered operators compensation for any remaining beds still in use.

According to melanoma specialist Professor Grant McArthur, the problem with sun beds is the intensity of UV radiation.

“It is actually five times-plus that of the midday sun,” he told the ABC.

“It gives very intense UV radiation to the skin over a short period of time. That’s why it significantly increases the risk of melanoma and skin cancers.”