Life-saving message at a hockey game: “It was just one moment in our lives where we crossed paths at the right time”
The 2022 NHL meeting between the Seattle Kraken and the Vancouver Canucks led to a vital medical discovery.
One chance sighting at an NHL game may well have saved a man’s life after a spectator was able to successfully diagnosed a serious health condition from afar.
In October 2022 the Seattle Kraken were preparing for the first-ever home game in the NHL. The Vancouver Canucks were the opposition and the team’s assistant equipment manager Brian Hamilton was busying himself with gameday jobs when a woman in the crowd had a worrying discovery.
Sitting a few rows behind Hamilton was Nadia Popovici, a hospital volunteer and budding medical student. She spotted a mole on the back of Hamilton’s neck, with an irregular border and reddish color. She identified the mole as a cancerous melanoma and decided that she had to take action.
“It’s so uncomfortable to have something on your body pointed out,” Popovici told the Seattle Times, before getting Hamilton’s attention and writing a message on her phone that read: ‘The mole on the back of your neck looks like it might be cancerous. You might want to go see a doctor.’
Hamilton saw the message and decided to get the mole checked out. Two days later he consulted the Canuck’s team doctor, who shared the spectator’s concern. They ordered a biopsy and it revealed that the mole was in fact a life-threatening Stage 2 malignant melanoma. Fortunately, Hamilton was able to have the mole removed and the danger was averted.
“She took me out of a slow fire,” Hamilton said. “The words out of the doctor’s mouth were if I ignored that for four to five years, I wouldn’t be here.”
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