YouTuber Ninja has revealed the major warning sign that made him seek professional help before he was diagnosed with cancer.
Twitch fans were left shocked to find out that one of their favorite gamers Ninja - real name Tyler Blevins - had undergone treatment for cancer after noticing something strange on his foot.
After noticing the abnormality, his wife - Jessica - booked an appointment for him to go and see a doctor so that he could get checked out properly and get to the root cause of the issue.
Speaking of his ordeal on X (formerly Twitter), Blevins told his fans that he's still in "shock" after his sudden diagnosis.
"Alright I'm still in a bit of shock but want to keep you all updated," he said in the tweet posted Tuesday (March 26). "A few weeks ago I went in to a dermatologist for an annual skin/mole check that Jess proactively scheduled for me."
Ninja then went on to state that a new mole on the bottom of his foot left him and his partner concerned.
"There was a mole on the bottom of my foot that they wanted to remove just to be careful," he continued, noting that the results indicated that it was a melanoma - the third most common type of skin cancer.
"...They are optimistic that we caught it in the early stages. I had another dark spot appear near it, so today they biopsied that and removed a larger area around the melanoma with the hopes that under the microscope they will see clear non-melanoma edges and we will know we got it," he said, before adding: "I'm grateful to have hope in finding this early, but please take this as a PSA to get skin checkups."
According to the Mayo Clinic, melanoma typically starts on skin that's often exposed to the sun with common areas of the skin being the arms, back, face, and legs. Rarer forms of the disease can also form in the eyes and under fingernails, though these can be harder to spot than on the skin.
Professionals urge patients who have noticed a change in their skin color or texture to seek medical advice so that if it is cancer, identifying it in the early stages can decrease the chances of further complications.
For Blevins, it seems as though it was caught pretty early on, which served as a relief to his friends as well as his fans.
"Holy s*** I’m glad you potentially caught it early. Wishing the best for you," wrote this user, while another also added: "Thank god you found it so early on. Wishing you health and happiness, Tyler."
DansGaming, another popular streamer, recalled his personal experiences with his mom who also battled the disease saying: "Glad you caught it early! This very procedure would have saved my mom's life if they caught it early enough."
With skin cancer on the rise, we can't stress the importance of going for regular mole checkups and also doing regular self-checks at home.
Our thoughts are with Blevins while he recovers from his procedures.
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