The first two sections of the AAD’s comprehensive undertaking focus on the biologics and psoriatic arthritis.

Bumps in the road to the implementation of the national provider identifier process.

Dear Readers,

Here at Skin & Aging, we’re busy planning ahead for 2009 — looking for new ways to continue to bring you, our readers, articles that provide clinical tips, insight into new treatments, and tips for better managing your practices. As we work to put our plan together, I feel lucky to work with such a talented staff, editorial board and group of regular contributors. I am also happy to take this opportunity to introduce you to a new member of our team, Group Publisher Steve Gephart, who can further help us with our goal of providing you with a quality issue each month.

In dermatology, we are fortunate to have many of our profession’s innovators and great teachers still among us. This column was created so that we may gain insight from these practitioners and learn more about them. Some are bright stars in our special universe — others unsung heroes. All of these colleagues have much to share from wisdom to humor to insights into dermatology and life.

As dermatologists we all have our individual styles of practice and favorite areas of dermatology on which we prefer to focus. But we all share one thing in common: We have a strong desire to improve our skills. Getting input from colleagues can help us achieve this goal, and it was why this column was created. This column highlights a wide range of pearls from practicing dermatologists — everything from a better way to perform a clinical procedure to a more effective method for communicating with patients to advice for improving an office function.