Mole removal (not the garden variety!)
 

Hi all

I have a few moles I want to have removed(for cosmetic vain purposes)

I see you can pay to have them done via BUPA ie hand over the cash and they do it, no need to be a member etc.

Just wondered if anyone had had it done?? Was it a laser or a knife??? What was the scar left like???

thanks

Andy

I had one removed off my leg as a teenager as it had a big lump on it and they thought it needed to be ripped out asap. Had it done under ther NHS.

Guess what? Yep they messed up. I had the mole cut out (it was huge and a good few inches for the root :eek: ) and I watched round the side of the sheet to see blood spurting everywhere when they cut me :D

Anyway they stitched me back up and I thought nothing more of it and went off on a school CCF training Army camp for the weekend. While walking in the middle of nowhere across fields I felt a rather wet patch on my leg, rolled my trouser leg up to find blood everywhere and bloody great hole in my leg :eek: :D The stitches had completely come out :o All the other kids were like :cool: lol

Had to leave and go to hospital where they were amazed at what had happened. Due to the depth of the cut I was supposed to have had secondary internal stitches to hold the cut together but I had only been given surface stitches :rolleyes: The nurse who saw me said it was negligence on the part of the original person who had done the minor op. Turns out it had been a junior doctor who had done it. They didn't stitch me back up the second time around and put a chemical on the hole and patched it with dressing. Now have a nice oval shape scar about an inch long on my leg. Tried to get compensation from the NHS but thats like trying to get blood out of a stone :rolleyes:

Funnily enough not had any more removed since then ;)

I've had 3 moles removed as they were suspected cancerous.

Most moles are only on the surface, there are however some that have active blood supply & go deeper. Mole with an active blood supply should sometimes be removed as they are high risk.

The first mole I had removed was privately. The incision was deep with a wide margin cut around the mole to ensure removal of cancerous material. This for a mole of about 4mm in size has left a scar on my arm of 30mm x 7.5mm. The 2nd 2 moles removed by my GP were not high risk mole so were removed without margin. They have both left a round scar of about the size of the original mole. I couldn't watch, but my wife told me that the GP pulled the mole up & neatly cut around it with a scalpel. The GP's stitching did not hold, hence the round scars.

For cosmetic purposes, it will leave a scar which will fade in a year or so, but the scar tissue will remain. If it's on your face, get it done privately. I can recommend a good specialist clinic in London.

Had one removed from my chin about 3 months ago, kept cutting the bloody thing off, had it done on the NHS, had to wait about 6 weeks, very happy with the result, just a small circular mark, which i believe will fade to nearly nothing!

A Small injection, then he cut round the mole with a scalpel, and then sealed the vessels. Painless!, No stitches, had to wear a plaster for about a week, and had a small scab for a couple of weeks.

Andy

If I had all the moles removed from my face, I would have no face left.

I too like Avi have problems when shaving, you catch them, and they bleed like hell, especially if your going somewhere nice.......:rolleyes:

I think I will pay a visit to my GP, coz there are a couple Im worried about. They change colour, from brown to black.
I love to sit in the sun, I go abroad each year to sunny places, and I use the odd (shhh) Sunbed. Im blond and fair skinned too, so apparently Im high risk.

Later Moley.....

I already went to the GP (had one done a while back) but have ideally 3 I would like to have done, then I would be mole free :) they only seem to be into putting you forward if it is a real problem and then she said - when you get to the surgery to have it done they can turn you down!! Like you would literally turn up thinking gonna have this taken off today only for the doctor to say nope sorry, not big enough/problematic enough etc..................hence Im gonna cough up and get em all done at once - if I can

I had one removed last year... it was a sticky out type and had gone all funny :(

The doc sliced it off with a knife and sealed it with a lazer-beam!

Ex-bird once had one removed from her neck too... not so sticky out as mine was, she had it proper cut out with a knife and the hole stiched up!

Thanks JC.

Ive picked up some nice DIY tips there.

I work as a general surgeon - maybe I can offer some advice.

Unless you've got money to burn, forget the private option if you've got several moles to be removed. Expect £500 per mole.

If you go to your GP and say I'd like to have these moles removed, there are a few possible outcomes. Firstly, the GP might offer to remove them (they have financial incentives for carrying out minor surgery). However, the most likely outcome (assuming that your GP agrees that they need to be removed) is that you will be referred to a dermatoligist or a general surgeon to have them removed. I am familiar will the latter since I have in the past carried out these procedures many times. These operations are usually called Minor ops and are almost always done under local anaesthetic. Unfortunately, it tends to be the case that in the NHS, these procedures are carried out by junior surgeons (some whom have done little or no operating before). The results are not surprisingly less than perfect.
The best option is to request (to the GP) that the procedure(s) be done by a plastic surgeon. The results are usually better and you'll probably get an experienced surgeon. The only problem is that you might have to wait longer to have the procedure done.

D.

Mole removal privately is around £200 depending on location etc.

Had mine frozen off for free at the local GP surgery by the nurse. Freeze it, wait two weeks for it to die and drop off, repeat as necessary. This is lumpy ones. If it's a flat one I guess you have to get it cut out.

This was a non-busy rural GP. Tried the same in an urban GP, they didn't want to know, too busy.

what does a suspect cancerous mole look like ??

There's no hard & fast rule. Often the GPs are wrong, as they say that a mole that changes colour or becomes irregular in shape is at risk. However it's only a generalisation.

You need to check your moles every month. Look for moles that have changed in any way & take a photo of it. My own cancerous mole was very small, it had turned in a short space of time from light brown to very dark brown, slightly raised & perfectly round. It was removed, tested & found to have abnormal cells. However every mole is different, you have to watch them all. I now use a clinic in London that as a SIAscope that uses light waves to check the composition of moles.

Large pokey up moles usually have an active blood supply which means they could turn cancerous in the future.

could this work???


http://www.wart-mole-vanish.com/index.html

You need to ask someone qualified in dermatology. Personally I would muck around when it comes to avoidable cancer risk.

I attack mine with a soldering iron, sounds sick i know but does the job and it dies and drops off in a matter of days too ;)

Nick, You have a private message.

Please read it.

Cheers Yoza.

Replied by pm.

doesn't that hurt?? and smell funny afterwards???

He's a robot! ;):D:D

Yes it hurts like hell, but you know the saying, no pain no gain :D I found it the most effective way by far for getting rid of unwanted moles, creams etc dont work on me and surgery is done as i said with a soldering iron, smells like bacon cooking too :D :eek:

i have loads and loadsof moles, mostly on my arms, they have never botherd me tbh