Psychodermatology services guidance: the report of the British Association of Dermatologists' Psychodermatology Working Party

The British Association of Dermatologists (BAD) has now published on its website the BAD Psychodermatology Working Party's report into the provision of psychodermatology services.1 This essential guidance underscores an important emerging subspecialty of dermatology that is gaining an increasing voice and momentum. In 2012, the BAD Psychodermatology Working Group, a national multidisciplinary team, was asked to report to the BAD membership on the extent of psychodermatology services and training across the U.K. In addition we were asked to develop a report indicating minimum standards and resources that should be available regionally across the U.K. The group membership included dermatologists, psychiatrists, psychologists, and nurses who work in psychodermatology. Psychodermatology includes primary dermatological disease associated with psychosocial comorbidities (such as patients with psoriasis who have anxiety, depression or both, or who have suicidal ideation) and primary psychiatric disease presenting to dermatologists (such as delusional infestation, body dysmorphic disorder and dermatitis artefacta). It is clear that patients with primary psychiatric disease presenting to dermatologists are fairly common, and that patients with chronic skin disease who experience psychosocial comorbidities are extremely common.2 And yet, the provision of care for such patients is sporadic across the U.K. and Europe, and probably globally. In fact the number of dedicated U.K. psychodermatology clinics appears to have decreased in the last 10 years. The objectives, then, of the BAD Psychodermatology Working Party are outlined in Table 1.