Teen diagnosed with stage 3 cancer after doctors initially said symptoms were 'puberty'
Rhianna Benson
Featured Image Credit: MD Anderson Cancer Center/Youtube
Not longer after his 15th birthday, high schooler Samuel Gee noticed a patch of skin on his back had suddenly changed.
He'd had a mole there since he 'was little', but one day, it looked particularly differently, appearing to have altered in both colour and size.
The observation was initially made by his wrestling referee during a routine health check, during which they recommended that he 'get it checked out'.
"It almost looked like it was drying out," the student, who is now 19, and studying biomedical engineering at university, told TODAY.com of his mole this week. "I had the mole ever since I was young, but over the years it gradually (became) raised."
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Despite feeling initial unconcerned with the mole, Gee obeyed his referee's wishes, and had his parents book him an appointment with his dermatologist.
By the time said appointment rolled around, however, the teenager was more concerned with another health issue, as a puffy lump had also appeared in Gee's right leg.
After googling the possible causes of the growth, the teenager became convinced that he was battling an inguinal hernia, a condition whereby part of the intestine pokes through the abdomen near the groin.
"I had some serious swelling," Gee says of the protuberance. "I thought it was an inguinal hernia."
Whilst raising the issue of his mole, he also asked his doctor about the lump, during which he was allegedly dismissed.
According to the university student, his GP put the lump down to 'puberty', as he said: "He was like, ‘It’s not a inguinal hernia, but likely [an] swollen lymph node. He’s like, ‘It’s just from puberty … Come back in a few weeks if it hasn’t gone away'."
Unconvinced, Gee's family arranged a follow-up appointment with a paediatric surgeon, where he discovered that not only did he have stage 3 melanoma with regards to his mole, but the cancer had also spread to his lymph nodes, which had caused the swelling.
Looking back on his diagnosis this week, Gee confessed: "I was definitely surprised. I was in shock."
He was referred for immunotherapy in 2020, around the same time that Covid-19 pandemic saw schools across the US shut down.
Thankfully, however, Gee says this predicament aided his management of the symptoms of the immunotherapy.
"I would get fatigued a little bit," he recalled. "It would make me nauseous. It was a very day-to-day thing. Some days I would feel fantastic.
"Some days I would feel like I needed to throw up or I was really tired."
The following year, the teenager underwent surgery, during which both the melanoma and the lymph nodes were removed.
After several more rounds of immunotherapy, he was ruled cancer-free.
"I was disease free," he said. "That was when they said, ‘OK you’re cured."
The American Cancer Society says that skin cancer is by far 'the most common of all cancers in the United States', with melanoma counting for one percent of diagnosis'.
Now, Gee is a 'total sunscreen freak', adding: "I hope people will start wearing their sunscreen. … That’s really what I want to get across is wear sunscreen, don’t tan on purpose."