Yoon Cohen recently sent us an invaluable handout presented by Dr. William James at a meeting she attended. She wrote: “As an osteopathic resident, I attend our annual American Osteopathic College of Dermatology Conference every Fall. One of the highlights of the conference each year is a series of lectures from the Department of Dermatology at University of Pennsylvania. This year, Dr. William James has shared diagnostic and treatment lessons that he has learned over the years. He emphasized the importance of teamwork — sharing of our gifts freely with each other. Dr. James closed his talk with some final thoughts that resonate with Dr. Walter Shelley’s pearls of wisdom. … Continue reading
Category Archives: Cohen, Yoon
Window of Opportunity
Abstract: A young dermatologist discovers that treating the patient may entail more than just examining his skin. Sometimes, it is more important to treat the person than address the “chief complaint.” Keywords: doctor-patient relationship, aneurysm, skin exam, IT’s a busy morning at the clinic. My next patient is a 62-year-old man. After some small talk, he quickly turns to the point of his visit: evaluation of suspicious skin lesions on his back. “I’m only here because my wife’s concerned about these two spots. Otherwise, I feel fine.” He seems to be in a hurry, so I quickly examine his back and find only benign keratoses. When I offer to do … Continue reading
Dermatoscopic Diagnosis of Scabies
Dr. Cohen is a dermatology resident at LECOM/Alta Dermatology in Mesa, Arizona. Email YC. Keywords: scabies, dermoscopy, delta sign, triangle sign, diagnosis Scabies is an itchy skin condition caused by a tiny burrowing mite called Sarcopetes scabiei. A scabies diagnosis can be confirmed by taking a skin scraping and seeing the scabies mite, scybala (its pellet-shaped feces), or ovum under the microscope. However, the traditional scabies preparations can be challenging to obtain in certain patient populations, such as young children. Dermatoscopy’s advantage is that it is non-invasive, painless and highly diagnostic in practiced hands. We would like to briefly discuss the typical dermatoscopic features that are seen in patients with … Continue reading
Human Microbiome (Introduction)
The human microbiome is the collection of microorganisms (such as bacteria viruses and fungi) which live on and inside humans (on the skin, in the saliva and mouth, in the eyes, and in the gut and the rest of the gastrointestinal tract). Foreign microbes outnumber human cells in the body a wide margin; humans have about 100 trillion cells, and carry ten times as many microorganisms in the intestines alone. We know that some of these organisms are useful for humans. However, most have no known effect; they are just symbionts and are referred to as the normal ‘flora.’ Studies in 2009 asked whether our health is damaged if we reduce this biota (collection of … Continue reading