'The human contact feels as good as any treatment or cure': Adrian Chiles reveals skin cancer diagnosis and operation relief
Columnist and West Brom fan Adrian Chiles has detailed a recent skin cancer diagnosis and the treatment he had received to remove the carcinoma from his shoulder.
The 58-year-old TV presenter, from Quinton, had spoken about his health scare in a Guardian column he had penned about a move to booking appointments online.
He said that after being told that the object on his shoulder was a squamous cell carcinoma by a dermatologist, he had gone through apps and multiple letters and had only found out that the cancerous cells had been removed when he received a telephone appointment.
According to the NHS website, a squamous cell carcinoma is a non-melanoma skin cancer that starts in the top layer of skin and is often easily treatable, with its most common cause being ultraviolet light, which comes from the sun and is used in sunbeds.
Mr Chiles said he had booked an appointment with a dermatologist after noticing a change in the skin on that area.
Discussing his return to the hospital for the excision, he said: "I was back in for the excision, performed by the same guy I’d seen before. This time, he said he was pretty sure it was cancer, cancerous, a carcinoma, whatever.
"All I wanted him to do was stop saying worrying things and, instead, whip out his scalpel, go in as deep as he fancied, and dig the thing out. This he did."
He said that while he had been offered a hospital appointment, he decided not to drive the 200 miles for the appointment as he had also been expecting, and had received, a telephone appointment which, he said, gave him the good news he was hoping for.
He said: "I was too beside myself with gratitude to moan much about not being informed that this would be happening.
“'Admin’s a totally different department' the nurse on the phone said, apologetic but helpless. She was kind, she was knowledgeable, she was all I’d wanted. It took just five minutes.
"Oh yes, I almost forgot, it was a squamous cell carcinoma. All removed and won’t spread. So not nothing, but not serious. Needs keeping an eye on.
"Whatever, I don’t care, because I now have this skin cancer nurse’s email. The human contact feels as good as any treatment or cure."
