WASHINGTON — Professional gamer and online personality Ninja revealed he has been diagnosed with skin cancer.
Ninja, whose real name is Tyler Blevins, shared the news Tuesday with his followers on X, formerly known as Twitter.
"Alright I’m still in a bit of shock but want to keep you all updated," the Twitch streamer shared. "A few weeks ago I went in to a dermatologist for an annual skin/mole check that Jess proactively scheduled for me. There was a mole on the bottom of my foot that they wanted to remove just to be careful. It came back as melanoma, but they are optimistic that we caught it in the early stages."
"I had another dark spot appear near it, so today they biopsied that and removed a larger area around the melanoma with the hopes that under the microscope they will see clear non-melanoma edges and we will know we got it," Ninja said.
The 32-year-old gamer then urged his followers to schedule skin checkups.
"I’m grateful to have hope in finding this early, but please take this as a PSA to get skin checkups," he said.
His wife, Jessica Blevins, took to social media to thank followers for the wave of support following Ninja's announcement.
"I probably wouldn’t have started scheduling annual skin checkups yet if we didn’t move to Florida. Foot melanoma is not sun-related, so it would have been there anyways and we might not have found it," Jessica said on X. "Also, thank you for your outpouring love. I’m here to be strong for Ninja and give him all the help and support he needs!
"We feel strong knowing God is walking with us through all of this!" she added.
Ninja, who has 19 million followers, is the most-followed person on the popular streaming platform Twitch. He's most known for playing Fortnite, so much so that Epic Games developers released a Ninja "skin" so players can look like him while playing the game.
The gamer also has a huge following on YouTube with 24 million followers.
What is melanoma?
Melanoma is a kind of skin cancer, according to the Mayo Clinic.
It often starts on skin that's exposed to the sun, such as on the arms, back, face and legs. The first signs of melanoma are changes in an existing mole or a new "pigmented or unusual-looking growth on the skin."
It's important to note that melanoma doesn't always start as a mole and can happen anywhere on the body such as the soles of the feet and fingernail beds.
While there isn't a clear cause of all melanomas, most are caused by exposure to ultraviolet light, the Mayo Clinic explains.
