Some people avoid or delay seeking medical advice because their information is misleading or false. Some people believe that melanoma is not treatable. Melanoma is curable if detected and treated in an early stage of development. Timely detection and surgical excision of melanoma usually result in cure. This myth started 50 years ago, when patients delayed seeking medical advice until melanomas were large, oozing, and painful.
Neglected tumors have a greater chance of spreading to vital internal organs.
Once the cancer cells of melanoma are removed, these cells can no longer do harm. If the cancer cells of a melanoma have not spread elsewhere before surgical removal, then cure is probable. Melanoma is the least common but potentially most deadly of the main types of skin cancer. The more common epithelial skin cancers, basal cell cancer and squamous cell cancer are curable at least 98 percent of the time. Epithelial skin cancers cause local destruction of tissue but rarely spread to vital internal organs.