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THE number of moles on your right arm is an indicator of how likely you are to get skin cancer, a new study suggests.
People who have more than 11 moles on their right arm could have a higher risk of skin cancer, research published in the British Journal of Dermatology says.
King’s College London researchers say they have found a new way for GPs to quickly assess whether somebody may be at risk of developing melanoma.
Counting moles in a ‘proxy’ body area such as the arm is a good marker for spotting potential problems, according to the experts.
About 20 to 40 per cent of melanoma is thought to arise from pre-existing moles and having more than 100 moles on the body is a strong predictor.
But the Cancer Council says that your body has other indicators that can reveal how susceptible you are to developing melanoma.
“The more moles you have and the more freckles you have, the more skin damage you are likely to have,” Cancer Council public health committee chair Craig Sinclair said.
“If you have a lot of moles on your body it does suggest a higher risk of skin cancer or melanoma, as does fair skin, red or blonde hair and blue eyes.”
Mr Sinclair said cancerous moles were most often located on the legs, head and neck of a woman and on the torso of a man but could appear anywhere.
He said moles and freckles were ‘generally grouped together when it came to a direct corelation between the risk of cancer’.
“There are two types of moles: those you’re born with and those that develop over time,” he said. “And there are freckles, which are generally a more immediate response, and by that I mean within a few years, to UV exposure.”
The mole study, funded by the Wellcome Trust, examined data from 3,594 female twins. Specially trained nurses from St Thomas’ Hospital in London performed a mole count on 17 areas of each person’s body. Skin type, hair and eye colour and freckles were also recorded for the research.
The results were checked against a further study involving men and women. Scientists found that the count of moles on the right arm was most predictive of how many moles were on the entire body.
Those people with more than seven moles on their right arm had nine times the risk of having more than 50 moles on the whole body. Those with more than 11 on their right arm were more likely to have more than 100 moles on their body.
