White House: Jill Biden has 2 cancerous lesions removed

Presidential physician Dr. Kevin O’Connor says examinations showed that the lesions over Biden’s right eye and on her chest were both confirmed to be basal cell carcinoma.

prepare to board Marine One

First lady Jill Biden walks out of the White House in Washington, Wednesday, Jan. 11, 2023, as she and President Joe Biden prepare to board Marine One. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh)

Surgeons removed a cancerous lesion above first lady Jill Biden’s right eye and one on her chest, the White House said Wednesday, while a third lesion on her left eyelid was being examined.

Dr. Kevin O’Connor, the physician to President Joe Biden, said examinations showed that the lesion over Jill Biden’s right eye and one newly discovered on her chest were both confirmed to be basal cell carcinoma. The lesion on her left eyelid was “fully excised, with margins, and was sent for standard microscopic examination,” according to O’Connor’s report.

Basal cell carcinoma is the most curable form of skin cancer. It is a slow-growing cancer that usually is confined to the surface of skin — doctors almost always can remove it all with a shallow incision — and seldom causes serious complications or becomes life-threatening.

  • WHYY thanks our sponsors — become a WHYY sponsor

The Bidens spent the day at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center in Bethesda, Maryland, where the 71-year-old first lady had the scheduled outpatient procedure known as Mohs surgery to remove and examine the lesions. After nearly nine hours at the hospital, the president returned to the White House solo; the first lady was expected to follow later in the evening.

O’Connor said the first lady was “experiencing some facial swelling and bruising, but is in good spirits and is feeling well.”

Basal cell carcinoma is so common there aren’t good counts. The American Cancer Society lumps them in with another easily treated type called squamous cell cancers. About 3.3 million Americans get one of those two types each year and the vast majority are basal cell, according to the organization.

Her office announced a week ago that doctors had discovered the lesion during a recent routine skin cancer screening. She was to have a “common outpatient procedure known as Mohs surgery to remove and definitively examine the tissue,” said O’Connor in a Jan. 4 memo that the first lady’s office released last week.

  • WHYY thanks our sponsors — become a WHYY sponsor

That surgery involves cutting away thin layers of skin and examining each layer for signs of cancer. Doctors keep removing layers of skin and examining them until there are no signs of cancer.

Doctors recommended removing the lesion from Jill Biden “in an abundance of caution,” O’Connor wrote in the memo.

The Skin Cancer Foundation said the delicate skin around the eyes is especially vulnerable to damage from the sun’s ultraviolet rays.

The surgery was arranged for the morning after the Bidens returned from Mexico City, where the president held two days of talks with the leaders of Mexico and Canada.

In April 2021, the first lady had a medical procedure that the White House described only as “common.” Details were not provided. The president accompanied her to an outpatient center near the campus of George Washington University, and they returned to the White House after about two hours.

Biden also accompanied the first lady to Walter Reed in July 2021 for outpatient treatment after she punctured her left foot while walking on a beach in Hawaii. She had stopped in Hawaii for official events after participating in opening events for the Tokyo Olympics.

___

AP Medical Writer Lauran Neergaard and AP White House Correspondent Zeke Miller contributed to this report.

Never miss a moment with the WHYY Listen App!

WHYY is your source for fact-based, in-depth journalism and information. As a nonprofit organization, we rely on financial support from readers like you. Please give today.

Want a digest of WHYY’s programs, events & stories? Sign up for our weekly newsletter.

Together we can reach 100% of WHYY’s fiscal year goal