Associate feature: No more waiting. AI for skin cancer detection is here.

Meet DERM, the only AI cleared to make clinical decisions in the cancer space.

The mounting pressures on dermatology services in Scotland mirror the global dermatology crisis; ageing populations and rising skin cancer rates continue to collide with chronic workforce shortages and dermatology teams are fighting to maintain the standard of care in the face of unprecedented demand.

With referrals for urgent suspected skin cancer increasing, yet skin cancer conversion rates remaining low, finite dermatology resources are spent reassuring healthy patients rather than patients in greatest need. In addition to demand challenges, remote Scottish geographies mean some patients face lengthy journeys or extended wait times to access care. The stark reality is that a patient's postcode can dramatically influence their access to a skin cancer diagnosis, ultimately impacting survival rates.

Despite NHS Scotland's efforts to bridge these gaps through solutions like teledermatology, and the 25 by 25 programme, we know from NHS England’s learnings that teledermatology just isn’t enough and building proven and appropriately regulated AIaMD takes years. Unfortunately, patient harm remains within our systems right now while patients wait to see specialists. Teledermatology still relies on the same overstretched workforce to see 100% of patients. We need to look at a different solution to sustainably handle demand and provide equitable dermatology services across a geographically diverse nation.

That solution: Artificial Intelligence as a Medical Device (AIaMD), called DERM.

I’m Rachael Dovey, Commercial Director at Skin Analytics; having spent some of my best years living on the West coast of Scotland, I couldn't be more excited to bring DERM to Scotland.

Skin Analytics builds the world's most advanced skin cancer pathways using DERM. DERM assesses, screens and triages lesions that are suspicious for skin cancer​; it does this by analysing dermoscopic images of skin lesions and classifying the most common malignant, pre-malignant and benign skin lesions​ - in seconds. For dermatology teams, this looks like removing patients with benign lesions from dermatology case load and expediting those with suspected skin cancers to their care: finding cancers, increasing capacity and reducing wait times.

DERM holds regulatory approval of the highest level of conformity as the first and only Class III CE marked AI as a Medical Device for skin cancer. This underlines DERM’s safety, accuracy and effectiveness in detecting cancer without clinician review. Regulatory approval at this level is typically reserved for critical devices like pacemakers or neurological implants.

DERM provides an autonomous, flexible and transformative solution for dermatology services whether in a community or hospital setting. With Scotland’s GP diagnostic challenges, variation in referral practice across localities and geographic barriers for patients, implementing DERM can provide specialist level assessment in the community, promoting care closer to home all while speeding up access to critical diagnosis.

And this is proven in the real-world. Supporting NHS dermatology teams in England since 2020, DERM is currently deployed at 22 NHS sites across primary and secondary care and has been used in pathways that have seen 140,000 patients, found 14,000 cancers and avoided the need for up to 95% of face-to-face appointments.

Having been part of the Skin Analytics team since our first ever deployment, I am honoured to be a part of the movement that is forming the next generation’s health service. But it’s been a long road to get here. Turning a piece of code into a regulated medical device and deploying it successfully into real-world healthcare pathways is a gargantuan, interdisciplinary project. Unlike most health-tech companies, we took our time to commercialise and spent the first 8 years on research and development, starting in 2012. Building safe clinical AI is a long journey that’s encompassed clinical validation, external scrutiny, support from NHS England and the UK government - in addition to the regulatory commitment required to secure and maintain the only AI cleared to make clinical decisions in the cancer space.

We’ve seen our share of detractors and critics over the years, which is inevitable when you’re trying to build the future. But as the volume of evidence for DERM has grown, and the performance of our pathway has become undeniable, these dissenting voices have begun to drop away. When I reflect on DERM’s journey, I liken it to the acceptance of other groundbreaking advancements that once faced resistance but are now widely used - the adoption of AI in radiology, the birth of IVF and the discovery of penicillin.

Join me and Dr Dilraj Kalsi at Digital Health and Care Scotland 2025 to understand the practical steps for implementing DERM, take away our learnings from NHS England, start reimagining dermatology and - ask me anything.

AI for skin cancer detection is here and your patients deserve it.

This article is sponsored by Skin Analytics. 

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