Mohs Surgery
Mohs surgery is an outpatient procedure providing the most accurate means of removing common types of skin cancer, such as basal cell carcinoma and squamous cell carcinoma, while preserving healthy tissue around a suspect mole or lesion.
Mohs surgery can be more than 98 percent effective at treating certain types of skin cancer. During the Mohs procedure, all of the tissue around the surgical margins is evaluated, instead of just a sample.
Mohs surgery is most commonly used for the treatment of skin cancers in the following circumstances:
- Where the skin cancer is located in a place where scarring is a concern, such as on the eyelid, ear, nose or lips.
- When the skin cancer has recurred after being treated by another method. A recurrent cancer can be more difficult to remove because it may grow beneath the scar before surfacing, resulting in its true borders being difficult to identify.
- When the skin cancer is on an area of the body that is conducive to more aggressive growth, such as the center of the face.
- When the skin cancer's margins or borders are indistinct, so that it is difficult to see where skin cancer ends and normal tissue begins.
- When a skin cancer has been surgically removed, but the pathology lab report indicates that some of the cancer has been left behind. (This may sometimes be described as the cancer having "positive margins." In these cases, a scar may exist without other visible evidence of skin cancer.
About Mohs Surgery
- Want to learn more? Read our FAQs about Mohs Surgery.
- If you are scheduled to have this procedure done, please read our pre-surgical instructions.
- After the procedure, please read the post-surgical information.
- SkinCancer.org describes the Mohs procedure as the one that stands the test of time.
SLUCare Mohs Surgery Locations
Center for Specialized Medicine
1225 South Grand
St. Louis, MO 63104
314-617-3722
Get directions to Center for Specialized Medicine
SLUCare Des Peres Medical Arts Pavilion II
2315 Dougherty Ferry Road, Suite 200A
Des Peres, MO 63122
314-617-2191