What many of us don't realise is that a suntan is not a sign of good health. It's a defence mechanism of the body that protects certain cell components against damage, but which is ultimately insufficient in preventing ageing and changes in the skin that could lead to cancer.

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Think back to your childhood: can you remember a few blistering days in the sun?

While you might religiously be using sunscreen now, the scary fact is that the sun exposure you got as a child or teenager might affect you years later. Research shows that 80% of sun-induced skin damage occurs before the age of 18 and manifests later in life.

The problem is that UV skin damage is often invisible to the naked eye, even though it might already be present from as early as the age of four. To gain a better understanding of what sun exposure does to your skin, check out our Sun Exposure Tool, and see what faces look like with the naked eye and then when examined under a UV light.

"You only need three blistering sunburns to greatly increase your chances of developing skin cancer – and that's in a lifetime," says Dr Dagmar Whitaker, dermatologist and president of the Melanoma Advisory Board of South Africa. "The skin never forgets damage, however small it may seem at the time."

Do a regular self-examination
Since it's impossible to erase your history of sun exposure, you need to take other steps to ensure that skin cancer doesn't take its toll on your health. The key is to get to know every centimetre of your skin – where your birthmarks, moles and blemishes are and what they usually look and feel like – in order for you to pick up any changes as soon as possible. The earlier skin cancer is diagnosed, the greater the outcome.

The best way of keeping an eye on your skin is to do a regular skin self-examination. We've compiled a step-by-step guide – complete with pictures of normal and abnormal moles – to help you with this process.

If skin cancer still isn't really a reality for you, it might help to take a look at these pictures of patients with early as well as more advanced, untreatable forms of skin cancer. But be warned, the pictures are definitely not for the faint-hearted!

- (Carine van Rooyen, Health24, updated January 2008)
 

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