San Diego dermatologist raising awareness after Khloé Kardashian cancer scare

Reality TV’s Khloé Kardashian has given San Diego dermatologist Tess Mauricio a high-profile platform to heighten awareness about skin cancer.

Kardashian assumed a harmless-looking spot on her face was nothing to worry about — but it was.

After the blemish didn’t disappear, seven months later she had it examined by Dr. Mauricio, who has offices in Miramar, Eastlake and Beverly Hills.

It was in the Beverly Hills office of her M Beauty Clinic on N. Rodeo Drive that Mauricio examined Kardashian. Mauricio urged Kardashian to let her perform a biopsy.

The pathology test came back showing that this facial tumor was not an ordinary zit, and this diagnosis was confirmed through a second biopsy by Dr. Daniel Behroozan in Los Angeles.

“What they both were seeing was incredibly rare for someone my age,” Kardashian, 38, noted in a series of Instagram stories she posted Oct. 11.

She immediately arranged to have the blemish removed by L.A. surgeon Garth Fisher.

A telltale bandage on her cheek had fans speculating about the cause. She turned to Instagram to share details saying she had heard numerous stories going around about the “ever-evolving bandage” on her face.

“You’ll continue to see my bandages and, when I’m allowed, you’ll probably see a scar (and an indentation in my cheek from the tumor being removed) but until then I hope you enjoy how fabulous I’m making the face bandages look,” she posted.

Mauricio says she can’t speak directly about her treatment of Kardashian due to patient/physician confidentiality, but she used Khloé’s Instagram story to bolster her own post about the importance of early detection of any new or changing spot on the skin or any pigmentation change.

“Most benign lesions should be gone within four weeks, but if it stays after four weeks then it needs to be evaluated by a board-certified dermatologist,” Mauricio says. While Kardashian wasn’t diagnosed with skin cancer, if such a growth was left untouched, the risk increases of developing cancer.

Dr. Fisher praised his celebrity patient during in interview streamed on Fox News digital: “I was just amazed at how mature and how courageous she was.”

He explained he had to make a large cut to ensure he got it all.

“I had to get significant margins from that, which I’ll tell you, to take off something in the middle of somebody’s cheek, it doesn’t matter who it is, it’s not a comfortable thing to do.”

Kardashian has made no secret of having a family history of melanoma, having had surgery at age 19 to remove a melanoma on her back.

She noted online that even those who don’t have a predisposition to melanomas should be checking regularly. “I am someone who wears sunscreen every single day, religiously, so no one is exempt from these things.”

Actor Leslie Jordan in 2021 during a promotion for his book, “How Y’all Doing?: Misadventures and Mischief from a Life Well Lived.”

(Damian Dovarganes/AP)

Jordan always had a smile

Richard Flannery considers himself fortunate to have gone to the Starbucks at Fifth and Robinson in Hillcrest with friends one afternoon in 2018.

For it was there that he spotted Leslie Jordan, the Emmy-award winning actor known for the long-running TV sitcom “Will & Grace,” as well as his roles on “American Horror Story,” “Call Me Kat” and “The Cool Kids.”

Flannery left his table to walk over and welcome Jordan to San Diego.

“We had a very friendly chat, and he was by himself so I asked him if he would like to join us for some holiday cheer at my table.” Flannery expected Jordan to respond with a polite “no,” as he knew the actor/comedian was performing his comedy show at Martinis Above Fourth that evening.

To Flannery’s surprise, Jordan said that he would love to join them.

“He confided in me that he was lonely when he arrived in a city where he didn’t know anyone,” Flannery recalls. “He had time on his hands before the show and between shows and even after shows. ... He charmed my whole table with fun, warmth and telling real stories, as did we.”

The public relations consultant said the sitcom comedian stayed with the group and swapped stories for about two hours.

“I got to know him beyond the showman that I had seen many times before,” Flannery says. “I was surprised to hear him say that he got lonely.”

Flannery followed Jordan’s career, especially during the pandemic when Jordan did a regular podcast that boosted his popularity.

Over the past couple of years, as he posted jokes and updates on social media while people were staying home, his Instagram account accumulated nearly 6 million followers, and he had more than 2 million TikTok fans.

“He was a trailblazer and would look for opportunities to connect with his fans and professional peers even when his industry was frozen,” Flannery says.

Given the comedian’s untimely death at age 67 in a single-car crash Monday, their chance meeting is a memory that Flannery cherishes.

“He will be missed greatly and left this world happier and with smiles.”