There’s no question, sun-tanners are going to look like prunes.

Dr. Comron Maleki, 40, is a dermatologist whose practice is in Thousand Oaks. He is president of the San Fernando Valley Dermatological Society. He moved his practice to California from Detroit five years ago and found a change in life style and a change in diagnoses. Maleki and his wife, Mehrnaz, live in Thousand Oaks.

I was born in Tehran, Iran. When I took the entrance exam for medical school, there were 30,000 people applying, and they had 500 seats in the medical schools. I said, “Let’s give it a shot,” and I made it.

My family was very happy, and I was very happy too, because it was my plan all through high school to become a doctor. I’m the 14th generation of physicians in my family. It’s the obligation of the first-born son to become a doctor.

My father had 23 brothers and sisters. Four of my uncles were doctors. Maybe more than 10 of my cousins are doctors. I hope that if I have a child he’s going to become a doctor.

I’m the first one in my family who came to the United States for medical education and postgraduate training. Most of them went to France. I went to Wayne State University in Michigan and was trained with very excellent teachers.

In Michigan I was lucky, I was able to join a practice and work at the university at the same time. I had my own house. Life was good. But it reached a limit. Life wasn’t exciting there any more. When I came in ’75 for the first time to visit California, I liked it. I said, “I’d like to retire here. Why don’t I go now instead of waiting to retire?”

I liked the challenge to build another practice here. Being a foreign medical graduate, having the accent, I’m coming here and if I make it that’s going to be different. So I packed everything that I had into my car and I drove to California. I saw almost all of the national parks on my way so it took me about four weeks.

In Michigan the bulk of my practice was acne. Mostly here is sun-induced cancer of the skin. There’s seven times more cancer of the skin here compared to Michigan and Minnesota. I see much more melanoma here percentagewise. Melanoma is the skin cancer that kills.

In the 19th Century, whoever had a tan wasn’t very good because he was a laborer. Then they found that if you have money, you can have somebody to work for you, so you have leisure time to tan. That’s why people started tanning themselves, to express their wealth. Now we are seeing that effect by so many cancers of the skin.

Tan doesn’t mean that you’re healthy and you’re wealthy. Laying out in the sun is not good. People who lay in the sun or play volleyball between 10 and 2 get the peak of the damaging rays and have a higher incidence of cancerous skin. If you don’t get cancer, you get early age, thickening of the skin. There’s no question, they’re going to look like prunes. I see it on a frequent basis. Severe sunburn is one of the things that increases your chance of actually getting cancer of skin, especially melanomas.

I started the first free clinic for cancer of the skin in this area about five years ago. This year, nine dermatologists in this area are offering this free cancer clinic. It’s going to be the first week of May and the following Tuesday. The idea is that if you have a question about some lesion on your skin we can tell if it’s necessary to have further studies on it. So you get a free check-up. You just call (805) 497-7588 or 495-1066 and make an appointment.

California has turned out to be much more than I expected. I met my wife here. I got married two years ago, and the practice is coming along very well.

Life is more stressful in California. Although people seem to be very friendly here, the relationships are not that strong, compared to Michigan. I knew all of my neighbors when I was in Michigan. I have good friends here, but I don’t know most of my neighbors, which is unfortunate. People seem to be distant, compared to Michigan, although it’s colder weather.