The smallest skin cancer in the world!

Today I had the opportunity to watch a friend and colleague accept a Guinness World Record award for the work that he and his team did in finding the smallest skin cancer in the world. Dr Alexander Witkowski, MD, PhD is an Associate professor of dermatology at the Oregon Health and Sciences University in Portland Oregon He is also one of the providers that I work with as a medical assistant in my day job, and he is also going to be one of the drivers on Team Truck Melanoma. His academic interest and passion is in early skin cancer detection and he specializes in Reflective Confocal Microscopy which is a specialize machine that allows skin cancers to first be detected through a virtual biopsy before the patient undergoes a physical biopsy. 

The Skin cancer that was found was a 0.65 mm Melanoma in Situ. In situ is Latin for in it's place, and this means that this skin cancer was caught before it ever had a chance to spread elsewhere in the body. 

Congratulations to Dr Witkowski and team for such a great catch, and helping to pioneer this type of technology in the united states. You can read the official OHSU press release here:https://news.ohsu.edu/2023/04/27/media-event-ohsu-clinical-team-to-receive-certification-for-detecting-the-worlds-smallest-skin-cancer?fbclid=IwAR0Q5xJCqcxh2J5NyQAp_GhR8Lo2xypRqKW1CanOq4rBnYLdCZ5ky8T6EcA.