Teledermatology suspected skin cancer patient information

This information is for patients who have been referred to teledermatology.

Attending a photo clinic appointment

Your primary care clinician is concerned that you could have skin cancer and has referred you to a dermatologist (skin specialist) to assess this further.

The hospital offers a service to assess skin lesions such as yours remotely, saving patients from travelling to the hospital.

For this assessment to take place, photographs of the skin lesion and clinical information will be sent securely to the hospital dermatology department for review by a dermatologist.

You will be contacted by the hospital by letter or phone with a diagnosis and a treatment plan, if required.

Following review of your images, if you need a hospital appointment, the hospital will contact you directly to book it.

Please do not attend the hospital unless you are contacted – review of the images taken today may appear in your NHS App, but it is not an appointment you need to attend.

The Health Care Assistant you are seeing will take three separate photographs of the area of concern on your skin, one to identify the area of the body and two more close-up photographs.

How to prepare for your appointment

To make sure photographs taken clearly show the area of your skin affected, please make sure that:

  1. If there is a scab or crust on your skin and you can:
  • soften the skin whilst waiting for your appointment by regularly applying an emollient (gentle moisturising) cream to reduce any irritation
  • soak the area of skin with a clean, warm cloth before attending your photography appointment – the scab or crust may come away easily
  • ask a friend or relative to help you if the scab/dried material is at a site you cannot see
  • where the scab does not come away easily please do not attempt to force it
  1. You have removed jewellery and any make up from that area of skin before you attend the appointment

What are the benefits of this service?

Offering a remote service will save many people from travelling to hospital for an outpatient appointment.

A remote assessment service has been successfully trialled in Bristol and is in use across the country, with positive feedback from patients.

What happens next?

  • Once you have attended the photo clinic appointment, a referral will be sent securely to the hospital dermatology department.
  • The referral will be reviewed by a dermatologist.
  • You will be contacted by the hospital by letter or phone to be given a diagnosis and informed whether any further assessment is needed.

If you have not heard from the hospital after 21 days, please contact:

University Hospitals Bristol and Weston

Phone: 0117 342 6388

North Bristol NHS Trust

Phone: 0117 414 0538

Your feedback matters

We would like to have feedback on your experience of this service. Has it worked for you?

We may contact you by letter or phone in the next 4 weeks to ask for feedback.

Storage of the photographs and confidentiality

Our files are stored and accessed in accordance with the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR 2018.)

Your photographs are named and transferred to our image database for permanent storage as part of a hospital medical record. Your images are accessible only to the staff involved in your care.

Chaperones

If you would like a chaperone present, please ask the member of staff taking your appointment.

Patient questionnaire

Ahead of your appointment, please fill out this questionnaire.

Patient questionnaire