This is personal...

My dad, Dan Vargo, was diagnosed with Stage 3 melanoma in 2019 right after Memorial day on his right temple after finally having a festering mole checked out.  Three surgeries on his face and neck, two different treatments, and a broken arm, he's about to go into year 4 of remission.  If he can get to year 5 with clean scans, he'll be considered cured.

December 2023 I'm having my annual skin check.  My dermatologist marks and takes off a mole.  This is nothing new to me, I often randomly joke that my derm visits are "mole roulette" and let's just pick any two and see what's going on since i have so many.  But this one was different... it wasn't big at all, it wasn't raised, but it wasn't circular and was mixed pink and tan.  I hadn't noticed it, neither had my boyfriend.  But you know what it was- melanoma.  I had stage 1 Melanoma.  Easily treated by a wide local excision in the doctors office (well not easy for someone like me who is prone to fainting).

Finally, I've of course have dedicated my life and career to cancer research so it's time to have some fun and raise some funds.  I've been the scientist in the lab trying to understand what makes a cancer cell act differently.  I've worked with patients who are so brave to try the new treatments that might give them a few more months or hopefully years.  I even worked on the melanoma clinical trial that lead to the approval of the drug my dad was first treated with!  

If melanoma can affect my dad and I, it can affect you and your loved ones too.  So join me in walking on August 3, 2025 at Edgewater park by joining Team Vargo (we're pretty cool) or donate here directly to the Melanoma Research Fund.  You're not only funding melanoma research, you're also funding cancer research in general.  Many successful treatments in use today for lung, kidney, bladder, breast, colorectal, some lymphomas- basically you name it- started with melanoma research and treatments.  Melanoma research unlocked a major discovery on how we understand the relationship of the cancer within the human body,

Step up and donate to Miles for Melanoma today.