Skin Cancer Treatment Options

If you’ve been diagnosed with skin cancer, there are several different treatment options that you can pursue. Depending on your doctor’s recommendations, you may receive surgical, non-surgical, or a combination of these two treatments. Here at Dermatology Associates, our team has both the experience and knowledge to craft a treatment plan that is personalized to your unique diagnosis, medical history, and any other existing conditions.

Non-Surgical Skin Cancer Treatment

Whether you have a basal cell carcinoma, melanoma, or another form of skin cancer, Dermatology Associates offers a broad range of treatment services that can help you fight it. If your diagnosis warrants it, our team may recommend one or more of the following non-surgical skin cancer treatments:

  • Freezing: If you have actinic keratoses or another small, early-stage skin cancer, this procedure can freeze it off with liquid nitrogen. Once it’s frozen, the dead, cancerous tissue will shed away.
  • Radiation therapy: This method kills cancer cells by using high-powered beams of energy, like X-rays. This option is normally employed when skin cancer cannot be removed by a surgical method.
  • Chemotherapy: Many people are familiar with this treatment method, which uses drugs to kill cancer cells. If your cancer is present on the surface of your skin, chemotherapy can be applied in a topical form. Otherwise, systemic chemotherapy is used to treat skin cancer that has spread elsewhere in the body.
  • Photodynamic therapy: This treatment method first uses drugs to make existing skin cancer cells sensitive to light. Then, it employs laser light to kill them.
  • Biological therapy: Also called immunotherapy, this treatment method induces your immune system to attack and kill your skin cancer. It does this by making the cancer cells easier for your immune system to recognize.

Surgical Skin Cancer Treatment

There are several types of surgical skin cancer treatments available, including the following procedures:

Excisional surgery

This treatment modality can be used to treat any kind of skin cancer. During this procedure, a surgeon cuts the cancerous tissue and a surrounding border of healthy skin out of your body. Depending on the severity of your cancer, our team may remove extra healthy skin surrounding the tumor to reduce the risk of relapse.

Mohs surgery

Considered the most effective treatment modality for both basal and squamous cell carcinomas, Mohs micrographic surgery boasts a cure rate as high as 99%. As a part of this treatment, a doctor removes a patient’s cancerous growth layer by layer, examining each layer beneath a microscope to tell if it has become noncancerous. By doing this, they can be sure to leave as much healthy skin intact as possible. As one of the few dermatology facilities in the area to offer this treatment, our expert team can help you determine whether Mohs surgery is right for you.

Curettage

This form of skin cancer treatment uses a circular blade to scrape away cancerous layers of skin. Then, either electrodesiccation, which uses an electric needle, or cryotherapy, which uses liquid nitrogen, is utilized to kill any remaining cancer cells.

Get Treated at Dermatology Associates

At Dermatology Associates, we have been providing skin cancer evaluations and treatment for patients in Fayetteville and the rest of central New York since 2008. For more information or to schedule an appointment, contact us today by calling 315-663-0100.

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