Serial Dependence in Dermatological Judgments

This research was funded by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) grant number R01CA236793.Peer reviewedPublisher PD

Toward a Discourse Community for Telemedicine: A Domain Analytic View of Published Scholarship

In the past 20 years, the use of telemedicine has increased, with telemedicine programs increasingly being conducted through the Internet and ISDN technologies. The purpose of this dissertation is to examine the discourse community of telemedicine. This study examined the published literature on telemedicine as it pertains to quality of care, defined as correct diagnosis and treatment (Bynum and Irwin 2011). Content analysis and bibliometrics were conducted on the scholarly discourse, and the most prominent authors and journals were documented to paint and depict the epistemological map of the discourse community of telemedicine. A taxonomy based on grounded research of scholarly literature was developed and validated against other existing taxonomies. Telemedicine has been found to increase the quality and access of health care and decrease health care costs (Heinzelmann, Williams, Lugn and Kvedar 2005 and Wootton and Craig 1999). Patients in rural areas where there is no specialist or patients who find it difficult to get to a doctor’s office benefit from telemedicine. Little research thus far has examined scholarly journals in order to aggregate and analyze the prevalent issues in the discourse community of telemedicine. The purpose of this dissertation is to empiricallydocument the prominent topics and issues in telemedicine by examining the related published scholarly discourse of telemedicine during a snapshot in time. This study contributes to the field of telemedicine by offering a comprehensive taxonomy of the leading authors and journals in telemedicine, and informs clinicians, librarians and other stakeholders, including those who may want to implement telemedicine in their institution, about issues telemedicine

The use of teledermatology for the diagnosis of skin cancer in adults

Background Early accurate detection of all skin cancer types is essential to guide appropriate management and to improve morbidity and survival. Melanoma and squamous cell carcinoma (SCC) are high risk skin cancers which have the potential to metastasise and ultimately lead to death, whereas basal cell carcinoma (BCC) is usually localised with potential to infiltrate and damage surrounding tissue. Anxiety around missing early curable cases needs to be balanced against inappropriate referral and unnecessary excision of benign lesions. Teledermatology provides a way for generalist clinicians to access the opinion of a specialist dermatologist for skin lesions that they consider to be suspicious without referring the patients concerned through the normal referral pathway. Teledermatology consultations can be ‘store-and-forward’ with electronic digital images of a lesion sent to a dermatologist for review at a later time, or can be live and interactive consultations using video conferencing to connect the patient, referrer and dermatologist in real time. Objectives To determine the diagnostic accuracy of teledermatology for the detection of any skin cancer (melanoma, BCC or cSCC) inNIH

Smartphone applications for triaging adults with skin lesions that are suspicious for melanoma

Background Melanoma accounts for a small proportion of all skin cancer cases but is responsible for the majority of skin cancer-related deaths. Early detection and treatment can improve survival. Smartphone applications are readily accessible and potentially offer an instant risk assessment of the likelihood of malignancy, so that the right people seek further medical attention from a clinician for more detailed assessment of the lesion. There is, however, a risk that melanomas will be missed and treatment delayed if the application reassures the user that their lesion is low risk. Objectives To determine the diagnostic accuracy of smartphone applications to rule out cutaneous invasive melanoma and intraepidermal melanocytic variants in adults with concerns about suspicious skin lesions.NIH

Telemedicine

Telemedicine is a rapidly evolving field as new technologies are implemented for example for the development of wireless sensors, quality data transmission. Using the Internet applications such as counseling, clinical consultation support and home care monitoring and management are more and more realized, which improves access to high level medical care in underserved areas. The 23 chapters of this book present manifold examples of telemedicine treating both theoretical and practical foundations and application scenarios

Smartphone Mobile Application to Enhance Diagnosis of Skin Cancer: A Guide for the Rural Practitioner

Primary care physicians occupy a vital position to impact many devastating conditions, especially those dependent upon early diagnosis, such as skin cancer. Skin cancer is the most common cancer in the United States and despite improvements in skin cancer therapy, patients with a delay in diagnosis and advanced disease continue to have a grave prognosis. Due to a variety of barriers, advanced stages of skin cancer are more prominent in rural populations. In order to improve early diagnosis four things are paramount: increased patient participation in prevention methods, establishment of screening guidelines, increased diagnostic accuracy of malignant lesions, and easier access to dermatologists. Recent expansion in smartphone mobile application technology offers simple ways for rural practitioners to address these problems. More than 100,000 health related applications are currently available, with over 200 covering dermatology. This review will evaluate the newest and most useful of those applications offered to enhance the prevention and early diagnosis of skin cancer, particularly in the rural population