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In a Suspicious Celebrity Growth Exclusive, Grey's Anatomy star Eric Dane shares with OK! magazine the harrowing experience of having learned that a melanoma had developed on his lip. Noticing a patch of what he thought was just chapped skin on his mouth, the actor credits the writers strike with allowing him the time to call a doctor and have check it checked out. (Yay, writers strike!) Little could he have known then of the topical ointment horrors to follow:

The malignancy was treated by freezing the cancerous tissue off with liquid nitrogen. Unfortunately for Eric, the actor had a severe reaction to a cream given to him for his lip after the treatment . "My skin is very sensitive," the actor most famous for playing Dr. Mark "McSteamy" Sloan, explains to OK!, "and my lip was traumatized by the procedure I had to go through."

His lip's overreaction to the medication created a painful scenario that made eating difficult, if not impossible. "I didn't eat very well for a couple of weeks and lost a bunch of weight," Eric explains, estimating that he dropped at least 10 pounds off his 6'1" frame while dealing with his cancer.

We shall keep our eyes trained on the supermarket checkout racks in weeks to come for status updates, and send Dane our heartfelt wishes for a speedy and lucrative recovery announcement in OK!. And again, we have to give thanks for life's little miracles: Not only for the work stoppage, which may have helped to save a hunky fake-doctor, but also for the absence of Isaiah Washington from the proceedings, who'd inevitably be threatened by his co-star's media coverage, eventually taking it out on him by loudly accusing Dane of being "a little mouth-cancery fa—ot" during a tense table read.