By GINA KINSLOW
GLASGOW — Jeri Ann Spencer and Alana Westmoreland, both 4, enjoyed ice cream sandwiches last week at the Glasgow City Pool.
The girls went to the pool with their families to enjoy a swim. Jeri’s mom, Jeny Spencer, applied an ample amount of sunblock.
“We are religious sunblock users,” Jeny Spencer, of Glasgow, said.
She uses a sunblock with a 50 SPF.
Spencer says she is concerned about skin cancer and damage the sun can do to the skin.
“That’s why we use such a high SPF,” she said.
Jeny Spencer prefers to lay out in the sun versus going to a tanning bed. Some of her worst sunburns she said, happened in a tanning bed.
She said when she’s lying out in the sun, she can either cover up or go inside when she feels she has had enough.
“I just know I can control it when I’m out in the sun,” she said.
But Jeremy Walker, manager of E-Z Tan in Glasgow, believes tanning can best be controlled at a tanning salon.
“At a tanning salon the UV rays are all the same. It is like a controlled environment,” he said. “When you are lying out in the sun, the UV rays are different. Sometimes they are extreme. When you go to a tanning salon ... you know how much you’re getting.”
Walker and his staff at the tanning salon caution customers about getting too much exposure while tanning.
“Any UV rays, if it’s in a tanning bed or in the sun, is not good for you. Moderation is what you’re looking for as with anything,” he said. “We go over with them what is safe and what’s not. Most people are aware that too much is not good for your skin.”
Some people believe getting a tan from a tanning bed is safer than lying out in the direct sunlight because tanning beds don’t emit as many UVB rays.
UVB rays are often dubbed the “tanning rays” and have a shorter wave length than UVA rays. UVB rays are more responsible for the burning effects of the sun.
“When you go out into the sun the UV rays are not calibrated like they are in a tanning bed,” said Dr. R. Brent Wright, medical director of T.J. Samson Family Practice Center.
Some people think getting a tan from a tanning bed is safer because they are less likely to burn due to the lower amount of UVB rays that are emitted.
“It may not be scientifically tested, but it is information people are listening to,” he said.
Wright believes the safest exposure to the sun is less than 15 minutes a day and preferably before 11 a.m. and after 4 p.m., avoiding the intensity.
However, he says both direct sun exposure and tanning beds have potential risks and could lead to the development of skin cancer and recommends wearing broad-brimmed hats and a sunblock with a 30 SPF or higher when out in the sun for long periods of time.
Thomas Stasko, associate professor of dermatology at Vanderbilt University, gives similar advice.
“There is no tan that is a healthy tan,” he said. “The exception to that rule is spray-on tans.”
The only danger of receiving a spray-on tan is an allergic reaction, he said.
People who opt for a spray-on tan versus going to the tanning bed or lying out in the direct sunlight should still wear sunblock, he said, because a spray-on tan does not protect the skin from either UVA or UVB rays.
Like Wright, Stasko recommends people use a sunblock with a 30 SPF or higher to help prevent the development of skin cancer.
“Skin cancer is the most prevalent cancer among Americans,” he said. “There are over 1 million new cases diagnosed every year. Fortunately, most of those are basal cell carcinomas.”
Basal cell carcinomas tend not to spread to other parts of the body and are one of the three major types of skin cancer. Approximately 80 percent of the 1 million new cases of skin cancer that are diagnosed each year are basal cell carcinomas, he said.
The other major types are squamous cell carcinomas, which have a small chance of spreading elsewhere, and melanomas.
“They are the bad skin cancers,” Stasko said. “They are the ones that can readily metastasize if not caught at an early stage and account for a majority of the deaths resulting from skin cancer.”
