Assessment of Malignant Melanoma Risk Factors and Their Attitudes Towards Protection from the Sun in Patients Applying to Family Physician Polyclinics

Abstract

Objective: To evaluate the risk factors of malignant melanoma (MM) and to determine their attitudes about sun protection in patients referred to family medicine policlinics. Methods: Our research is a descriptive cross-sectional study. A total of 241 voluntary patients aged 18 years and over referred to the Ankara Numune TRH Family medicine Outpatient Clinic Polyclinic between 1 September and 1 October 2016 were included in the study. In our survey, patients' sociodemographic characteristics, presence of malignant melanoma risk factors, attitudes towards sun protection were evaluated. Results: 58.9% of the patients were female, 41.1% were male and the average age was 32.1 +/- 0,7. Patients stated that they learned information about sun protection from the internet, TV programs, newspapers magazines according to frequency. Participants' use of sunscreen in daily life was 54.4%, while regular users everyday were 16.2%. Sunscreen use was significantly higher in university graduated patients, women and participants informed by a dermatologist (respectively p=0,043; p<0.001 and p<0.001). According to presence of malignant melanoma risk factors, 17,8% of participants had 0, of 33,6% had 1; of 31,1% had 2; of 12,9% had 3; of 4,6% had 4. While no significant difference was found between the risk factors and its daily sunscreen use (p=0.339); a significant difference was found between the risk factors and sunscreen use in holiday (p=0.025). Conclusion: Regular use of sunscreen was found to be very low. Family physicians should be actively involved in raising awareness of sun-protection in patients, which is the only preventable risk factor of MM.