La Roche-Posay pop-up event in Toronto. (Image: Ryan Emberley)
La Roche-Posay is expanding on its “Become a Skin Checker” campaign with a number of events and clinics aimed at encouraging early skin cancer detection.
Now in its second year and timed to coincide with Melanoma Awareness Month, the campaign is aiming to reach 1 million Canadians online or at various clinics.
Though the campaign is international in scope with 23 countries participating, there are several Canadian-specific components to the campaign, says Jasmine Tsang, product manager of La Roche-Posay in Montreal.
These included a Skin Checker event at Bloor and Yonge in Toronto on May 2 (Melanoma Monday), which offered free mole checks from a dermatologist on hand and La Roche-Posay samples and $3 off coupons for sunscreen. Another all-day event is being held May 12 at Complexe Desjardins in Montreal.
La Roche-Posay, a division of L’Oréal Group, makes the Anthelios line of sunscreen products.
The brand is also organizing Skin Checker Clinics for the first time to be held at 50 pharmacies in Montreal, Toronto and Vancouver in June and July. People can sign up at SkinChecker.ca as of May 15 with 20 appointments available in each clinic.
During the clinics, nurses or pharmacists will take photos of suspected moles with a device known as a mole scope and send the images to dermatologists. Participating patients will then get an expedited appointment with a dermatologist.
The additional Canadian events are being held because the country only has 500 dermatologists and wait times for appointments can easily take a year, Tsang says.
“This way we can have an even more broad reach,” she says.
The clinics and website also provide information on La Roche-Posay’s ABCDEs of moles, with each letter corresponding to an aspect of moles to which attention should be paid.
A video promoting the campaign shows a kitten using the ABCDE method to carefully check a Dalmatian for suspicious spots. It was created by Betc in Paris.
The video was based on the insight that people, including six out of every 10 Canadians, care more about the health of their loved ones than their own and can play a role in protecting friends and family by learning how to detect suspicious moles, Tsang says.
“It’s a lighter way to remind people to check everywhere,” she says of the video.
Launched May 2 on Facebook, the campaign had 53,000 “skin checkers” three days later. “The engagement is very high” and Tsang is confident the 1 million target will be reached.
Last year, an estimated 6,800 Canadians were diagnosed with melanoma, an easily preventable but potentially deadly disease.
The Colony Project handles public relations for La Roche-Posay.
