Meeting report - Alpine desmosome disease meeting 2024: advances and emerging topics in desmosomes and related diseases.

Desmosomes are adhesive cell contacts abundant in tissues exposed to mechanical strain, such as the stratified and simple epithelia of the epidermis and mucous membranes, as well as the myocardium. Besides their role in mechanical cell cohesion, desmosomes also modulate pathways important for tissue differentiation, wound healing and immune responses. Dysfunctional desmosomes, resulting from pathogenic variants in genes encoding desmosomal components, autoantibodies targeting desmosomal adhesion molecules or inflammation, cause the life-threatening diseases arrhythmogenic cardiomyopathy and pemphigus and contribute to the pathogenesis of inflammatory bowel diseases.

[Dermatological diagnostics in patients with "skin of color"- How confident are German dermatologists?].

Introduction: Diagnosis in dermatology is primarily based on the assessment and description of the clinical appearance of the skin. The German medical literature focuses almost exclusively on white skin, so it is questionable whether this one-sided training is sufficient to do justice to all patients since the diversity of skin types increases.

Methods: Online survey among German dermatologists regarding training and experience in the diagnosis of dark skin, difficulties in recognizing dermatoses and the desire for training and further education in skin diseases of "skin of color".

[Skin fragility in autoimmune blistering diseases of the skin].

In many disorders, skin and/or mucosal changes are dominated by blisters, wounds, or erosions. While these changes can be observed during infective, traumatic, metabolic, or inflammatory processes, these are normally clinical hallmarks of the disruption of the cytoarchitectural stability of the skin. Several proteins, such as those located in the dermal-epidermal junction zone and forming the hemidesmosomes, or those forming epidermal desmosomes are crucial for the maintenance of skin integrity.