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CNN Live Today

Avoid Sunlight to Reduce Chances of Skin Cancer

Aired August 15, 2001 - 14:32   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
STEPHEN FRAZIER: ... rising dramatically with melanoma, now one of the most common forms of the disease. It is diagnosed in people under 30 often. Our guest knows how hard it to persuade young people to stay out of sun. She is a very patient Dr. Robin Ashinoff, chief of dermitologic and laser surgery at New York University Hospital.

Dr., my personal thanks for hanging with us as long as you have today. DR. ROBIN ASHINOFF, NEW YORK UNIVERSITY HOSPITAL: Thank you.

FRAZIER: Let's talk about tans. For a long time we talked about how sunburns were the thing to worry about. A burn was very dangerous, but now there's talk that a tan itself is just as bad.

ASHINOFF: Well, a tan of the skin means that you have actually damaged your skin. Any tanning means that you have actually inflicted permanent damage to your DNA and I try to explain that to patients, especially younger patients.

And if they insist on being a brown dark color, there are so many great self-tanners now that one can use that you don't really need to get the real thing.

FRAZIER: You say, talking to patients, we are describing this dramatic rise in the incidents of skin cancer in young people. Is that true in your own practice, you have seen that personally?

ASHINOFF: Absolutely. I happen to be a skin cancer surgeon as well as doing other things in dermatology and I can tell you over the last ten to 11 years, patients coming in with skin cancer, both melanoma and nonmelanoma skin cancers has dramatically increased.

They are getting younger and younger. It's not unusual for me to see people in their late 20s and early 30s with Squamous Cell and Basil Cell carcinomas on their face, as well as melanomas.

FRAZIER: That is such surprising news when you think of how young children are slathered with SPV-50 by very very careful parents now, much more so more than someone of my advanced age would have been at the same stage in life.

ASHINOFF: Most of our sun damage is done by the age of 18. So it is definitely important to get the young children protected and get them into the habit of protecting their skin. But when they get to be teenagers and peer pressure and what they look like becomes important, I think that is the issue. You can no longer slather them up yourself. It as to be coming from there desire to protect their skin.

FRAZIER: For a long time the models in the fashion pages and the actors on TV were a little paler. But that seems to be ending now.

ASHINOFF: I think that there is still a turn toward alabaster skin. But I think that we are getting greater acceptance of the cosmetic self tanners which give you very natural looking tans. It's not like the ads of the 50s where everybody looked orange.

FRAZIER: And everybody looked streaky too. They have managed to deal with that issue. What else do you tell your patients? Is there any way to control a tan? Can you use a salon or a tanning bed?

ASHINOFF: We usually tell them definitely to avoid tanning salons. Tanning salons -- in fact, the American Academy Of Dermatology has come out in strong opposition to tanning salons -- we tell people to try and avoid sun exposure between the most potent hours of ten and three, to apply sun screen thickly enough and to reapply it every two hours especially if you are swimming if you are perspiring heavily, you have to reapply it.

That also comes with protection with hats and clothing as well, and never to sun bathe deliberately.

FRAZIER: Otherwise they can come to see you. And seeing you is pleasant enough, but you come with some of your tools such as your scalpel or nitrogen gun to freeze off stuff.

ASHINOFF: Unfortunately that seems to be the case.

FRAZIER: We are grateful for your explaining all this to us, Dr. Robin Ashinoff at New York University Hospital, thank you.

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