In the News: Why Some Skin Cancers Affect More Men

A fascinating new study may shed light on the reasons why men get more squamous cell skin cancers than women.

Squamous cell skin cancer is a type that is usually curable, and about 250,000 cases are diagnosed annually.

While squamous cell skin cancer usually isn’t fatal, it’s no laughing matter either. Squamous cell skin cancer can be disfiguring or even endanger health, if left untreated.Squamous cell skin cancer affects three times as many men as it does women. But why? Researchers have long thought that the reasons were linked to lifestyle – since men tend to be less zealous than women about protecting themselves from the sun. But an interesting new study suggests that the reason may lie in characteristics of male skin.

While the study was done in animals, it is the first of its kind to suggest that male skin has less innate protection against ultraviolet light than female skin – and that’s what makes it exciting.The study showed that after being exposed to ultraviolet light, the skin of male rats had lower antioxidant levels and diminished DNA repair capacity when compared to females.Although the females were more likely to suffer inflamed skin – a sunburn – after exposure to UV light, the males sustained more genetic damage from the same amount of UV light.

“Our data tells us that female skin has more antioxidants, compounds that scavenge DNA damaging chemicals,and potentially more mechanisms to repair DNA damage than male skin,” said Kathleen Tober, PhD, a research scientist in Ohio State’s Department of Pathology. “These gender differences suggest that female skin has a higher capacity for repairing sunlight induced DNA damage than does male skin.Without complete repair of this genetic damage, male skin is more prone to skin cancer than is female skin.”

Tober’s study was presented at the American Association for Cancer Research Frontiers in Cancer Prevention meeting in Philadelphia in early December.While the study points out one reason why male skin is more prone to skin cancer than female skin, it also underlines the link between the sun and the damage it can cause.

Overexposure to the sun’s rays can cause irrepairable damage to the DNA of skin cells –damage that may eventually lead to skin cancer. And while male skin may be more prone to this damage than female skin, all of us need to take heed to prevention messages about skin cancer. So, to my mind, this study is one more reason to cover up and slap on the sunscreen when out in the sun.