Farmer issues health warning

Surgery which has left Deniliquin farmer Doug Knight with a winding scar down one side of his face has almost certainly saved his life.An aggressive melanoma threatened to take his life within just months of diagnosis.Now, his medical team has a 12 month treatment plan in progress, which includes monthly treatments and tri-monthly scans to catch any further growth.‘‘There’s a 90 per cent chance they have caught it, but I will have scans every three months just to make sure nothing is coming back,’’ Mr Knight said.‘‘Every four weeks I have treatment using a new drug which is nicknamed ‘hide and seek’.‘‘Melanoma cells hide in the body, and this drug is designed to seek them out and kill them.’’Mr Knight had his first non-cancerous melanoma removed at least 20 years ago, and he’s had yearly skin checks ever since.It was only 12 months ago he had more non-cancerous moles removed from his shoulder.But Mr Knight has never before seen anything like the growth that popped up quickly and grew speedily just before Christmas.‘‘Without the surgery, they said I would have probably been dead in 10 weeks because it was so aggressive,’’ Mr Knight said.‘‘They took a culture of it and it grew significantly overnight.‘‘Just before Christmas I had a dark lump come up just over my (right) eye.‘‘I went to the doctor and at first it was thought to be a burst blood vessel.‘‘Within a week it had grown in size from about the size of a one cent piece to a 10 cent piece.‘‘The biopsy came back as melanoma.’’Mr Knight said it was through family connections he was scheduled to see surgeons so quickly, and he said the stars aligned when all the necessary surgeons could be available at one time.‘‘Normally they would remove all the spots, then come back later and reconnect the nerves and if you need a graft that’s a separate surgery as well.‘‘I only had to have one surgery which was lucky; could you imagine having to reopen this (the wound on his head) again?‘‘I didn’t end up needing a graft.  They had to remove 2 and a 1/2 inches of skin above my eye, but the surgeon pulled the skull across 2 and a 1/2 inches so we did not need a graft.’’With a mantra of ‘‘such is life’’ and ‘‘just get it done’’, Mr Knight knew he had to do whatever it took to make sure the cancer was stopped in its tracks.But he said he was a little shocked when he came out of the anaesthesia and realised the extent of the surgery.‘‘I had one positive node at the top of the head and one below my ear, and they took four or five others between the eye and the ear.‘‘It was a seven hour operation all up, at the Epsom Hospital, and I would have been under anaesthesia for at least nine hours.‘‘I don’t even know how many stitches they put in, and the nurses were only arguing about it the other day, but surprisingly they came out after seven days.  They do say the face heals quicker than any other part of the body though.’’Mr Knight said his ordeal is a timely reminder to everyone, but particularly farmers, about the need for adequate sun care and regular skin checks.He said while the cause of his melanomas cannot be pinpointed to one specific cause,  limiting the impact of the sun is always a safe bet.‘‘I have always worn hats and shirts, and it’s important for everyone to cover up.‘‘But my experience shows that even when you do that nothing is guaranteed.‘‘I get my skin checked every 12 months and some people recommend every six months.’’While he continues to share his time between Melbourne and his Deniliquin farm, Mr Knight said he knows he has to ‘‘take it easy’’.He said he’ll be able to do that with the help of Don Thomas and Matt Duffy who are helping him manage and cut his lucerne crops on a regular basis.