A mole should never be removed at home, as this is a surgical procedure that should only be done in a sterile environment, and only after a dermatologist is sure that the mole is not a malignant formation. Due to the very nature of skin moles, they cannot be removed, like a scar or a scab, as they are a part of your normal skin. A diagnosis on whether the mole is cancerous or not needs to be made before the mole is removed.
A mole, or a beauty mark, is a melanocytic nevus. This complicated name is better explained as a benign growth or neoplasm. Neoplasms are caused by the rapid creation and cloning of tumorous cells and can appear on any part of the body. However, when a neoplasm is termed as a benign neoplasm, the growth is harmless as is the case of a melanocytic nevus or mole. What makes the nevus different from the surrounding skin is it that the neoplasm is a collection of melanocyte cells. These can start out as a red or brown spot and progress to becoming very dark over a period of exposure to the sun. This is because of the basic nature of melanin that is created in the melanocyte cells. Melanin acts as a natural sun block all over the skin but one side effect of being a sun block is that melanin darkens with each exposure to the sun. Most moles occur during birth or within the first twenty years of life. Moles that appear during birth need to be examined, as they could be a melanoma. Moles that occur later in life also need to be examined but the chances of these being cancerous are slim.
A cosmetic surgeon can remove a mole by using cryotherapy, excision, and laser therapy. When cryotherapy is used, the mole is frozen using liquid nitrogen and then the frozen nevus is lanced away. Depending on the mole’s infiltration of the skin, a further cut might have to be made. Excision is a surgical procedure done under local anesthetic for a larger nevus. Laser therapy uses a high power laser to burn the nevus off. This is probably the best treatment that you can undertake but this depends on the extent of the nevus under the skin. Once destroyed, the nevus can come back again so this treatment method is best done after the dermatologist decides the best course of action.