Skin-cancer survivor's warning

NATASHA MARTIN/Timaru Herald

SUN SAFE: South Canterbury Cancer Society health promoter Kate Johnson, left, and skin cancer survivor Shirley Ellerbroek.

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After 10 operations for skin cancer and with summer coming up, Timaru's Shirley Ellerbroek Foster wants to warn people about the dangers of sunbathing and sunbeds.

The 45-year-old woman has had cancerous growths cut from her scalp, nose and chin over the past three years due to basal cell carcinoma.

Her ninth operation was last week and her 10th – and hopefully last – operation, a skin graft, was done this week.

Mrs Foster said as long as she saved one or two lives with her message, it would be enough.

"For all those people who think they're bulletproof – think again. It's not just you that goes through it, it's all the close people around you."

She attributes the high number of skin cancer growths to sunbathing and the use of sunbeds in the early 1980s and urged people to be safe this summer.

South Canterbury Cancer Society health promoter Kate Johnson said skin cancer was the most common cancer in New Zealand and 90 per cent of cancers were caused by sunburn and tanning.

Skin cancers were showing up in younger people, so adults needed to make the effort to educate children on being sun smart, Mrs Johnson said.

By making sunscreen part of the morning routine, children would get into the habit of putting it on. This was most important between September and April from 11am and 4pm, when the sun was at its strongest. A hat, sunglasses and sunscreen were just as important as a cellphone, keys and wallet. It wouldn't take much for children to keep sunscreen in their schoolbag or for women to pop some in their handbag, Mrs Johnson said.

Both women encouraged people to keep an eye out for changing freckles or moles and, if unsure, to get them checked by a doctor. "Don't think it'll never happen to you. That's what I thought," Mrs Foster said.

- © Fairfax NZ News