Biopsy

Today Charlie had a routine 3 month checkup with the pediatric dermatologist at UCSF (Dr. Frieden). We first met with her when Charlie was about 2 weeks old. At that time she seemed very unconcerned about all the bumps, lumps and spots on Charlie's nevus. Today when we saw her though she seemed much more concerned about them. She made a comment about how his nevus is "much more active than the average nevus" which I think means he has a lot going on on his nevus. She seemed to think that one of the spots had grown (although I don't really think it had grown) and another spot was bleeding last week so she was concerned about that one.

So given all these concerns she decided to biopsy two of the bumps on his nevus to check for melanoma (cancer). This was something we were unprepared for but knew it was probably for the best. We want to be proactive with Charlie's care and not be constantly worrying if something more is going on.

For the biopsy she had me hold his head (which he was not happy about!) while she injected some local anesthetic into his scalp. Then they took what looked like a metal straw and twisted it into his scalp and cut out little sections of the bump. This left small holes into his head. It was a little scary to look at. I kinda now wish I hadn't watched the whole thing. They then put a stitch in each spot to close up the hole and then bandaged his head. Needless to say Charlie screamed the entire time and tears rolled down his cheeks. It was heartbreaking.

We should have results in about a week. I'll keep you posted.