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Diagnostic imaging: Listening in to skin disease

Nature Biomedical Engineering volume 1, Article number: 0076 (2017) Cite this article

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Optoacoustic mesoscopy promises to be a fast and reliable non-invasive method for the diagnosis of psoriasis.

Histological analysis of a tissue biopsy is the current gold standard used by dermatologists1. Dermoscopy, on the other hand, is non-invasive, allowing for the in vivo evaluation of microstructures of the epidermis, the dermoepidermal junction and the papillary dermis. Although such skin structures are not visible to the naked eye, their detection is important because they correlate to diagnostic histological features. Dermoscopy facilitates the distinction between a malignant or a benign pigmented skin lesion, because the method defines structures by using a distribution of colours to identify patterns. However, dermoscopy can only be performed by expert clinicians2, and is therefore not widely accessible. Indeed, the clinician's experience is invaluable in the diagnosis of skin conditions and in the evaluation of the efficacy of treatment at follow-up, because methods that standardize diagnosis and that aid the clinician in making an informed decision have significant drawbacks.

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Figure 1: Imaging the skin with photoacoustic mesoscopy.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Biomedical Sciences, Dermatology Unit, Humanitas University, Via Manzoni 113, Rozzano-Milano, 20089, Italy

    Alessandra Narcisi, Rebecca Favaro & Antonio Costanzo

  2. Skin Pathology Laboratory, Humanitas IRCCS, Via Manzoni 56, Rozzano-Milano, 20089, Italy

    Alessandra Narcisi, Rebecca Favaro & Antonio Costanzo

Authors
  1. Alessandra Narcisi
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  2. Rebecca Favaro
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  3. Antonio Costanzo
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Correspondence to Antonio Costanzo.

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Narcisi, A., Favaro, R. & Costanzo, A. Diagnostic imaging: Listening in to skin disease. Nat Biomed Eng 1, 0076 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41551-017-0076

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41551-017-0076

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