New Committee member needed!

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The current BPG committee membership and terms of office are shown in the table on page 4.  From July 2006, Dr David Bilsland retired from the Chair, and Prof. Antony Young took over.  Dr Robert S. Dawe (Dundee) was elected earlier to the committee and commenced his term of office from the same date.  If you are interested in serving on the committee then please contact the secretary, for a copy of the downloadable nomination form and post, fax or e-mail it back.  Election to the committee will be by postal or e-mail ballot of all Full Members, if several candidates offer themselves.

 

Recent meetings and workshops

 

BSID 2006 Manchester

 

The guest lecture by Prof. Alan Lehmann (Sussex) at last year’s BAD meeting (on the XPD gene and the differentiation between XP, trichothiodystrophy and Cockayne syndrome) proved to be so popular that he was asked to expand on his work to a wider

audience: ‘XPD – one gene, two functions, three disorders.’

 

BAD 2006

 

The annual BPG scientific symposium, held in Manchester on 6^th July during the BAD conference, was well-attended, and was preceded by the BPG annual general meeting.  Our two invited speakers this year proved to be stimulating and controversial.  Prof. Richard Strange (Keele University) spoke about ‘Genes, environment and prostate cancer risk:  controversy regarding sunlight and vitamin D-related genes’ which suggested interesting relationships between prostate cancer risk and sun exposure.  Dr Jane McGregor (London) waited patiently as a stream of questions and comments followed, and then spoke authoritatively about ‘Sun, Science and Skin cancer – new perspectives on the interaction of UV, HPV and azathioprine in renal transplant recipients.’  Both our guest speakers drew a large and attentive audience, and numerous questions and comments.

 

BPG offers a prize for the best oral presentation, and this year the prize was won by Dr Kirsty Rutter et al. (Manchester) for a presentation on ‘Clinical and photo-biological characteristics of patients with phototosensitive psoriasis.’  Congratulations to the home team for their well-deserved prize.

 

 

Forthcoming BPG meetings and workshops

 

BSID 16-18 April 2007, Nottingham

BPG guest speaker to be confirmed.

 

BAD 02-05 July 2007 Manchester

BPG guest speakers to be confirmed.

 

 

An update to the PUVA Guidelines is proposed for the near future, under the leadership of Dr Alex Anstey (Newport, Gwent - Alex.Anstey@gwent.wales.nhs.uk).

 

The Topical PDT Guidelines are under review by Dr Lesley Rhodes, Dr Colin Morton and Dr Kevin McKenna, and a draft is anticipated by early 2007.

 

Further details of these workshops will be advertised in due course.

 

 

BPG website

The BPG website can be accessed at www.BPG.org.uk/ or by following the link from the BAD website.  Please send any feedback or suggestions for the website to the website editor Dr Robert Sarkany (Robert.Sarkany@gstt.nhs.uk.  A major restructuring of the website is planned for early 2007, which will allow quicker updates of web information.

 

Members occasionally ask about details of training courses in Photodermatology, which can be found on BAD’s website (www.BAD.org.uk) along with downloadable versions of some BPG and BAD Guidelines in PDF format.

 

 

PPP journal

A report from the co-editor Dr Lesley Rhodes:

 

The Group journal continues to be popular in the photodermatology/photobiology community and has a healthy impact factor of 1.3.  Review articles in particular score well in the impact rating, and we welcome good, up-to-date review articles across the spectrum.  If you have an idea for a review article then please feel free to contact me for initial informal discussions: (Lesley.E.Rhodes@manchester.ac.uk).

 

Plans have been ongoing for some time to put manuscript submission and review procedures on-line, and I am pleased to report that this will come to fruition in the very near future.

Relationships between the BPG and the USA Photomedicine Society are very good and growing, partly facilitated through the sharing of our joint journal PPP.  In my role as Co-Editor, I am ex officio on, and attend, the Board meetings of the Photomedicine Society, and likewise Editor Dr Warwick Morison is ex officio on the BPG committee.  Dr Michael Zanolli, the new President of the Photomedicine Society, has re-energised the plan for a joint membership of both societies, with one of the important benefits being that people can be a member of both groups without paying for the journal twice!  Michael and the Secretary have been working to produce attractive payment schedules reported elsewhere in this Newsletter.

 

The Co-Editor of PPP holds the position for a minimum of 3 and a maximum of 5 years.  My 5-year term will end in the spring of 2008, at which time I will be succeeded by Professor James Ferguson (Dundee).  Until then, please feel free to get in touch with me if you have any ideas or suggestions for improving the journal that I can take to the PPP Board meetings.

 

Lesley Rhodes, Co-Editor

 

Blackwells advise us that Full Members subscribing to PPP can access back issues (2000 onwards) by registering at the website (www.blackwell-synergy.com) using their Username and Password.  Click on the blue ‘My Synergy’ button at the top of the Home page to access PPP digitally.

 

 

 

 

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UK Skin Cancer Working Party

A report on recent activities from

Professor Brian Diffey

Newcastle-upon-Tyne.

 

The chair of this group is Dr Lesley Rhodes, and representatives from a wide range of bodies including the BAD, CR-UK, and DH normally attend the meetings.

 

Some of the recent items discussed include:

 

NICE Guidance on Skin Cancer Treatment

The ‘Improving Outcomes Guidance’ for the treatment of skin cancers was published on 22 February 2006.  A key feature in the standardisation of care of skin cancer patients is the establishment of multidisciplinary teams (MDTs), of which there are two types, the local hospital MDT and specialist MDT.  A template for action plans was published in July 2006, following which network leads must submit their plans by January 2007, for review by the Nation Cancer Director, Prof Mike Richards, by April 2007, and implementation by October 2009.

 

UV exposure guidance: A balanced approach between health risks and health benefits of UV and Vitamin D. Proceedings of an International Workshop, International Commission on Non-ionizing Radiation Protection, Munich, Germany, 17-18 October, 2005

A report of this meeting has been published in Progress in Biophysics and Molecular Biology (volume 92, issue 2, 2006) available at http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/journal/00796107

Members with academic ATHENS accounts should be able to access the proceedings.

 

Vitamin D Conference, House of Commons, 2 November 2005

The proceedings of this meeting are now available on-line at: http://www.healthresearchforum.org.uk/reports/sunbook.pdf

 

 

 

SunSmart Campaign 2006

The funding of the SunSmart Campaign, hosted by Cancer Research UK is, like many other national disease prevention campaigns, currently at risk of losing its funding from the Department of Health. Robin Graham-Brown (BAD President) and Lesley Rhodes (Chair, UKSCWP) have written to Patricia Hewitt urging that this funding should continue.

 

The SunSmart Campaign this year focused on early detection in male outdoor workers.  The campaign was launched on 15 May 2006.  UK SCWP has approved the series of leaflets and posters for the campaign, which are being distributed at a national level. 

 

Sunbeds

The sunbed industry is capitalising on the vitamin D controversy by promoting the apparent “health benefits” of their use.  There is concern regarding the increase in coin-operated sunbeds, and evidence shows that sunbed use continues to grow.  Cancer Research UK held a sunbed symposium, attended by UKSCWP representatives, on 11 September 2006, at which research data, that included a survey of coin-operated sunbeds and an exploration of the psychology of sunbed use, were presented. 

 

Sunscreens

The European Commission adopted on 22 September 2006 a Recommendation on the efficacy of sunscreen products and the claims made relating thereto. The recommendation defines claims which are unacceptable in relation to sunscreen products; recommends precautions to be observed including application instructions; the minimum efficacy standard for sunscreen products in order to ensure a high level of protection of public health; and simple, understandable labelling to assist in choosing appropriate products.

 

The recommendations can be found at

http://eur-lex.europa.eu.  After selecting your preferred language, click on Simple Search, then Official Journal, then enter 2006, 09, 26, L, 265 and 39 in the boxes on the search page.

 

The outcome of the public consultation is also available on-line at

http://ec.europa.eu/enterprise/cosmetics/sunscreens/synthesis_doc_06_06.pdf

 

Prof. Brian Diffey, Newcastle-on-Tyne

BPG representative

 

 

European Physical Agents Directive (Optical) 2006

 

Directive 2006/25/EC on the minimum health and safety requirements regarding the exposure of workers to risks arising from physical agents (artificial optical radiation) was published in the Official Journal of the EU in April 2006, and is now law.  Member States have until April 2010 to implement national legislation to meet it.

 

This is the third of a trio of Directives, also dealing with Magnetic Fields, and Noise & Vibration, and aims to introduce minimum health and safety requirements for the control of occupational exposure to optical wavelengths in the range 100nm to 1000 mm (the UV, visible and IR wavebands).  It therefore has a bearing on the activities of BPG members and their colleagues.

 

You can download the document from http://eur-lex.europa.eu and after selecting your preferred language, click on Simple Search, then Official Journal, and enter 2006, 04, 27, L, 114 and 38 in the boxes on the search page.

 

Briefly, the legislation is concerned with occupational exposure from artificial sources of optical radiation, and is therefore not applicable to medical treatments or solar exposure for social, domestic and pleasure purposes, but it will have implications for phototherapists, physicists and others whose work places them at risk of exposure from artificial sources.

 

Exposure limits set out in the document broadly follow the guidelines from the ACGIH, ICNIRP, and adopted by NRPB (now the HPA – radiation protection division), but formalise these limits in law.  One of the stated aims is “the timely detection of adverse health effects from exposure to optical radiation.”

 

 

Membership

Membership continues to increase and we now have around 110 members.  New members are always welcome and the Committee would urge current members to encourage their colleagues to join.  The BPG membership application form can be downloaded from the website (form attached).  The committee is keen to encourage applications from all professionals with interests in photo-dermatology, including phototherapists, nurses, technicians, scientists and doctors working in the NHS, university and industry.

 

 

The Photomedicine Society, USA

 

BPG members who attended the Annual General Meeting and scientific session in Manchester in July will recall that we were honoured by the presence of Dr Michael Zanolli, the new President of our sister organisation the Photomedicine Society (www.photomedicine.org), who made a special visit to the UK to be with us and to invite the Committee’s consideration of joint membership terms for members of BPG and PS.  As we share the same journal, the terms of joint membership will allow for Full Membership of both organisations, with one copy of PPP delivered to the member’s contact address.  BPG members will be able to participate in PS events in the USA.

 

BPG members may choose joint membership of both organisations for the annual subscription of £60-00, the extra £15 being to cover administration and clerical costs associated with the US membership.

 

BPG members who wish to take up joint membership should contact the Secretary, David Taylor, so that contact details can be passed to Suzy Milberger, the PS secretary, and to allow for revised subscription invoices to be raised by BAD.

 

 

 

Applied Photodermatology Course

Newport, Gwent

 

This 4-day course (2 days residential, 2 days distance learning) will run for the first time in March 2007, with subsequent annual courses.  The emphasis is on practical aspects of patient care, with particular attention to advances in management.  Theoretical aspects of photodermatology will not be covered in details and it is assumed that students will have prior knowledge of these areas from attending the relevant courses.

Course organiser: Dr Alex Anstey

email: Alex.Anstey@gwent.wales.nhs.uk

 

For further details, contact Margaret Smith, The Academic Dermatology Unit, Block C, St Woolos Hospital, Stow Hill, Newport, NP20 4SZ.

email: Margaret.Smith@gwent.wales.nhs.uk

 

 

BPG Mailbase

 

Have you ever wanted to ask for advice about a rare dermatological condition?  Have you organised a workshop or training course and want to tell BPG members about it?

Have you ever wanted to share information with BPG members, but not wait until next July?

 

With the BPG Mailbase, you can do all of these, with a simple e-mail message, and know that the readers of your message share your interests and concerns, and won’t fill your inbox with spam.

 

Clinical scientists will already be aware of the JISCmail facility set up for Medical-Physics-Engineering, which provides a convenient forum for physicists and engineers to exchange hints & tips, invite suggestions, warn others of important changes in legislation, problems with suppliers, and so on. There appears to be no similar mailing list for dermatologists, so we could be breaking new ground with the BPG mailing list.

 

In brief, any BPG member may subscribe to the list by applying to the list moderator (a task kindly undertaken by Dr Jim Lloyd).  Any message sent to the BPG list is automatically sent to all other subscribers, who may reply to the BPG list (where the reply is seen by all subscribers) or to the sender’s private e-mail address (when it will be seen only by the original sender).

 

The key steps to joining the BPG list are as follows:

 

To subscribe, send an email to listserv@jiscmail.ac.uk with the following EXACT message: SUBSCRIBE BPG FIRSTNAME LASTNAME (no subject is required).  The moderator will email you soon after with details of the mailing list operation, and ask for your confirmation by email, as a security measure. 

 

To send a message to all subscribers, simply send your email message to: BPG@jiscmail.ac.uk with a helpful subject that identifies quickly the topic you are mailing about.  Every BPG mailbase message will be prefaced by the initials BPG, so that they can be quickly identified.

 

To reply so that to ALL subscribers can read your message, click on Reply and send the message in the usual way. 

 

To reply ONLY to the sender, DO NOT click on Reply, but enter the sender’s email address in the address bar of a new message and respond privately.

 

Please be mindful of the need for anonymity and the Data Protection Act if case details are discussed or described.

 

To unsubscribe from the list at any time, simply send EXACTLY the following message to listserv@jiscmail.ac.uk:

UNSUBSCRIBE BPG FIRSTNAME LASTNAME.

 

There are hundreds of lists operated by JISCmail.ac.uk, and you can manage your subscription (and subscribe to others) by using the web interface which you can access at www.jiscmail.ac.uk .

 

 

 

 

 

Subscription collection

Members are reminded that subscriptions are collected by the BAD in January each year.  Previously subscriptions were collected by the BPG in March or August.  Many members set up standing orders in favour of the BPG but HAVE NOT CANCELLED THEM.  If you have not already done so, please check your bank statements for March and/or August and cancel any standing order.