Outpatient dermatology appointment wait times for United States military veterans, 2014-2021.

Trends in outpatient dermatology appointment wait times for United States (US) veterans are poorly characterized. Given concerns surrounding prolonged wait times at Veterans Health Administration (VHA) medical facilities, the federal government introduced the Maintaining Internal Systems and Strengthening Outside Networks (MISSION) Act in 2018, allowing veterans to receive VHA-reimbursed community care if VHA specialty care appointments cannot be scheduled within 28 days. Considering this expanded access to community care, we characterized among US veterans the (1) overall demand for dermatology appointments, (2) trends in average wait times, and (3) facility/geographic variation in wait times.

Overcoming Resistance Mechanisms to Melanoma Immunotherapy.

The advent of immune checkpoint inhibition has revolutionized treatment of advanced melanoma. While most patients derive survival benefit from established immunotherapies, notably monoclonal antibodies blocking cytotoxic T-lymphocyte antigen 4 and programmed cell death protein 1, a subset does not optimally respond due to the manifestation of innate or acquired resistance to these therapies. Combination regimens have proven efficacious relative to single-agent blockade, but also yield high-grade treatment toxicities that are often dose-limiting for patients.

Evaluation of the Content of Ophthalmology Fellowship Program Web sites.

 To assess the availability and content of fellowship program Web sites (FPWs) among ophthalmology subspecialties.  This is a cross-sectional study.  Web sites of all Association of University Professors of Ophthalmology-accredited fellowship programs in five subspecialties (i.

Predictors of sentinel lymph node metastasis in very thin invasive melanomas.

Background: Melanomas < 0.8 mm in Breslow depth have less than a 5% risk for nodal positivity. Nonetheless, nodal positivity is prognostic for this group.

Association of sociodemographic characteristics with utilization of sentinel lymph node biopsy for American Joint Committee on Cancer 8th edition T1b cutaneous melanoma.

Sentinel lymph node biopsy (SLNB) is an important staging and prognostic tool for cutaneous melanoma (CM). However, there exists a knowledge gap regarding whether sociodemographic characteristics are associated with receipt of SLNB for T1b CMs, for which there are no definitive recommendations for SLNB per current National Comprehensive Cancer Network guidelines. We performed a retrospective analysis of the 2012-2018 National Cancer Database, identifying patients with American Joint Committee on Cancer staging manual 8th edition stage T1b CM, and used multivariable logistic regression to analyze associations between sociodemographic characteristics and receipt of SLNB.

The current state of fellowship leadership in dermatology: trends in workforce demographics and scholarly productivity.

Interest in subspecialty training remains high for dermatology residency graduates. Fellowship program directors (FPDs) are largely responsible for fellowship organization and development. Here, we study the dermatology fellowship leadership landscape and identify notable differences in the characteristics of current dermatopathology, paediatric dermatology, and Mohs micrographic surgery and dermatologic oncology FPDs.

T-Cell Mediated Immunity in Merkel Cell Carcinoma.

Merkel cell carcinoma (MCC) is a rare and frequently lethal skin cancer with neuroendocrine characteristics. MCC can originate from either the presence of MCC polyomavirus (MCPyV) DNA or chronic ultraviolet (UV) exposure that can cause DNA mutations. MCC is predominant in sun-exposed regions of the body and can metastasize to regional lymph nodes, liver, lungs, bone, and brain.

Geographic disparities in access to immunotherapy clinical trials for metastatic melanoma.

Survival outcomes for metastatic melanoma have drastically improved with the advent of immunotherapy. Access to ongoing immunotherapy clinical trials has become increasingly important to patients with advanced disease. We sought to quantify geographic disparities in access to these trials by U.

Perception of culturally competent care among a national sample of skin cancer patients.

Given limited information about patient experiences with cultural competency within dermatology, we sought to characterize the perception of culturally competent care among skin cancer patients in the United States. We used the 2017 National Health Interview Survey (NHIS) to identify a sample of patients with skin cancer and analyzed responses to the following questions: "How important is it for providers to understand or share your culture?" and "How often are you able to see health care providers that understand or share your culture?" For each question, we calculated the overall prevalence along with adjusted odds ratios for each sociodemographic group. Overall, 31% (95% CI 27-35%) of skin cancer patients responded that it was very or somewhat important for providers to share/understand culture.

Imaging ligands targeting glypican-3 receptor expression in hepatocellular carcinoma.

Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is the third leading cause of cancer mortality. Early detection of HCC is important since potentially curative therapies exist in the initial stages of HCC; no curative therapies exist for late-stage HCC. However, the initial detection of HCC remains challenging due to the lack of symptoms during the early stage of the disease.