Many factors can increase your risk for developing melanoma. These risk factors include:
- Fair skin, light eyes
- Many freckles
- Severe, blistering sunburns as a child or adult
- Family history of melanoma
- Having had melanoma in the past
- Non-cancerous, unusual looking moles (called dysplastic nevi)
- More than 50 moles on the skin
- A weakened immune system
- Exposure to UV radiation from tanning salons and tanning beds
