Mother-of-two was told by doctors the rash on her shin was ‘just flaky skin’ for a DECADE… in fact it was cancer that’s left her with a cricket ball sized crater in her leg

A mum-of-two who was left with a cricket-ball sized ‘crater’ in her leg has claimed medics dismissed her cancer as ‘flaky skin’ for over a decade. 

Megan Grieves, from Leicester, first spotted a small mole on her left leg when she was just 15. 

But after being urged by her grandma to get it checked out, she says her GP believed it was dry skin and instead prescribed her moisturising creams. 

Despite the mole growing to the size of a 10 pence piece over the course of 13 years, she was repeatedly given other ointments to treat a ‘psoriasis’ flare up, she claimed. 

It was only after Mrs Grieves, then 28-year-old, was seen by another GP in 2016 that she was referred to a dermatologist and diagnosed with melanoma, one of the deadliest forms of skin cancer.

After two operations to remove the mole and surrounding skin from her leg she required a skin graft to cover the incision, leaving her with the permanent ‘crater’.

Recalling her ordeal, Mrs Grieves, now 36-year-old said: ‘I’d had a mole on my leg for as long as I can remember.

‘When I got to 15 years old my grandma said she didn’t like the look of it and told me to go to the doctors.

‘My mole would flake and bits would peel off. I think over a 10 year period I went to see the GP about this mole around 30 times.

‘I kept going back to the doctors and every time I would go to the GP they just told me it was dry skin or psoriasis and gave me E45 cream to try and prescribed me lots of different things.

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‘As time went on my mole got more scabby and flaky and would bleed sometimes.

‘It started off the size of a large freckle and went to the size of a 10 pence piece.’ 

After her dermatology appointment she was told to collect her results from hospital.

Mrs Grieves, a mum-of-two, said: ‘They asked me if I had come on my own and I knew then that something was wrong.

‘My heart just sank but I also was still very naive at this point and didn’t understand what could be so wrong about a mole.

‘Then they told me it was melanoma. The diagnosis impacted our lives massively. The recovery was really long and I was off my feet for a very long time.’

Around 15,000 Britons and 100,000 Americans are diagnosed with melanoma each year, the most common form of skin cancer. It is the fifth most common cancer in the UK, and numbers are rising. 

Increased UV exposure from the sun or tanning beds, has been blamed for the surge.

Despite huge strides forward in treatment that has seen survival leap from less than 50 per cent to more than 90 per cent in the past decade, it still kills more than 2,000 people a year. 

Melanoma is often fast growing and can quickly burrow through the skin and into the blood vessels beneath. 

Once the cancer cells get into the bloodstream, the disease can spread throughout the body. 

After Mrs Grieves’ second surgery in 2017, she claims she has been diagnosed with lymphedema, a chronic condition causing swelling in the body’s tissues, and fibromyalgia — which triggers pain all over the body. 

She added: ‘My grandma has passed away now but she kept me going. If it wasn’t for her, I may have never got my mole checked out. She saved my life.

‘They [the doctors] said they wouldn’t know how serious it [the skin cancer] was until I had the surgery.

‘They cut away a circle out of my leg and then I was left with an open wound.

‘[In the second surgery], they dissected some of the lymph nodes in the left side of the groin and did a biopsy on these. Fortunately I was told the melanoma hadn’t spread and I was really lucky.

‘I had a skin graft put over it now so it’s healed, but I have got a huge crater in my leg and it almost goes down to my bone. If I knock it is excruciating.’

She also no longer ever has bare legs in public after noticing ‘kids look at it’. 

She added: ‘I can’t even go to a theme park with my kids because standing in a line for a long time causes my leg to swell. The lymphedema will be with me for the rest of my life.’

Now Mrs Grieves is urging others to not ‘take no for an answer’ from their doctors or give up if they think something isn’t right. 

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She said: ‘The GP told me it was psoriasis for 10 years and patches of dry skin. This is what I say to people, don’t take no for an answer and go back to your GP again.

‘I’ve always covered up and never been on a sunbed so it shows it can happen to anyone but by not wearing sun cream and sunbeds it heightens your risk. 

‘No tan is worth what I went through.

‘What they tell you as a melanoma patient is that on the first day of every month you should check your skin in a mirror for new moles or changes.’

It comes as scientists last month revealed the world’s first personalised mRNA jab for melanoma is being trialled on British patients.

The vaccine is custom-built for individuals using the specific genetic makeup of their tumour – giving it the best chance of a cure.

It works by telling the body to hunt down cancer cells and prevent the deadly disease from coming back.

Early results of the jab – developed by pharma giants Moderna and MSD – found it drastically improved the survival chances.