Assessment of reflectance confocal microscopy for monitoring treatment of actinic keratosis and field cancerization with daylight photodynamic therapy.

Actinic keratosis (AK) is the most common pre-malignant cutaneous lesion of the skin, often associated with field cancerization. Daylight photodynamic therapy (DL-PDT) is used as treatment, showing good histological results. Reflectance confocal microscopy (RCM) may be useful as a non-invasive, real-time approach to monitor treatment, however, there is a lack of data on the correlation between RCM and histopathological findings in AK patients treated with DL-PDT. To correlate histological and RCM findings and evaluate the efficacy of DL-PDT in patients with AK and field cancerization treated with DL-PDT. Patients with field cancerization and a minimum of six AK lesions on the face were included in the study. A single session combining methyl aminolevulinate followed by two-hour daylight exposure of the face was performed. RCM and biopsy were performed before and after three months of the intervention to compare efficacy between patients using the Wilcoxon test, and concordance of the findings based on the different methods was analysed using the Kappa test. Twenty-four patients completed the study. An improvement in photodamage and a decrease in the number of AK lesions (45.3% reduction) was observed. Regression in atypia and dysplasia was observed via histopathology and RCM, however, there was poor agreement between the methods. No changes were observed after treatment for inflammation, fibroplasia and acantholysis. Concordance between histological and RCM findings was poor, suggesting that RCM cannot replace the histopathological examination, however, it may be used as an adjuvant test for follow-up of patients. Despite this, DL-PDT proved to be an effective method for treating AK.

Use of Smartphones in Telemedicine: Comparative Study Between Standard and Teledermatological Evaluation of High-Complex Care Hospital Inpatients.

BACKGROUND: It is estimated that there are around 7 billion mobile phone subscriptions worldwide. Considering the availability and convenience, it appears to be a suitable device for store-and-forward (SF) consultations. INTRODUCTION: Although teledermatology has been suggested as an effective way of reducing costs and providing otherwise inaccessible expert evaluation, most studies have relied on high cost and high technological means. MATERIALS AND METHODS: We conducted a study with inpatients that required dermatological evaluation in a high-complexity university hospital, accessing the correlation between traditional face-to-face evaluation and SF teledermatology, with data and pictures collected by medical students using smartphone cameras and then sent to consultants by e-mail. RESULTS: For 2 months, we evaluated 100 patients and, as a result, the total agreement between both consultation modalities was 54%, the partial agreement was 27%, and the disagreement was 19%. DISCUSSION: This study points out that SF teledermatology with the use of mobile phone is comparable to traditional face-to-face evaluation. Furthermore, most of the disagreements were probably related to the inexperience of the medical residents. CONCLUSION: Our study suggests that a smartphone-based teledermatology inpatient consultation model could be a reasonable option for hospitals lacking dermatological services. Also, it may be as or more effective than face-to-face consultations, if performed by a more experienced dermatologist. When feasible, photographing training should be performed.