April is Oral Cancer Awareness Month, and with the baseball season just underway, the Seattle Mariners and DenMat in partnership with LED Medical Diagnostics have teamed up to offer the players and staff VELscope Vx oral cancer screenings during spring training in Peoria, AZ.
Mariners pitcher Felix Hernandez prepares for his screening with the VELscope Vx. Image courtesy of DenMat.The Seattle Mariners are one of only a few Major League Baseball clubs utilizing the VELscope Vx to screen their players for oral tissue abnormalities.
"We strongly encourage all Major League Baseball clubs to step up their fight against oral cancer through education and annual use of advanced oral cancer screening tools such as the VELscope," said Rick Griffin, Mariners senior director of athletic training.
The VELscope's blue-spectrum light causes the soft tissues of the mouth to naturally fluoresce. Healthy tissues fluoresce in distinctive patterns, which are visibly disrupted by trauma or disease. While the VELscope should not be used as a standalone diagnostic aid, when used in conjunction with the standard oral soft-tissue exam, it provides useful visual information, according to DenMat.
