The British Association of Dermatologists (BAD) and the Royal College of Pathologists (RCPath) have issued a statement about opportunities for AI in dermatopathology.

BAD and RCPath recognise that AI has the potential to support dermatopathology by streamlining cancer detection, reducing turnaround times and assisting with workload management.

The adoption of AI, however, must be carefully managed, with human oversight remaining central to patient care. AI may aid case prioritisation and cancer detection, helping to improve consistency and reduce errors. At the same time, challenges around infrastructure availability, data quality, regulatory approval and interpretability must be addressed before AI can be widely deployed.

In the meantime, it is paramount that medical data repositories are prepared in computationally tractable formats and that digital pathology infrastructure, particularly whole slide imaging systems, are scaled up to support upcoming AI research initiatives.

The BAD and RCPath recommend that AI technologies are developed to meet clear clinical needs, with close collaboration between dermatologists, dermatopathologists, molecular pathologists and AI developers. Any implementation should undergo a pre-development assessment by stakeholders of its potential clinical benefits and improvements so that scarce resources are not compromised in unpromising avenues. This should be followed by a post-deployment evaluation of clinical outcomes and cost-effectiveness across the patient pathway.

Medicus Pharma has completed patient enrolment for its phase 2 SKNJCT-003 trial, evaluating the safety and efficacy of SkinJect Doxorubicin Microneedle Array (D-MNA) to treat nodular basal cell carcinoma (BCC).

The study is currently underway in nine clinical sites across the US and has recruited a total of 90 US patients. Medicus expects to release top-line study results early this year, and to secure an end-of-phase 2 meeting with the US FDA in the first half of the year.

The SKNJCT-001 trial included 13 participants and met both its primary endpoints of safety and tolerability, with the drug being well tolerated. No serious adverse events were reported.

Interim results for SKNJCT-003, released in March 2025, demonstrated more than 60% clinical clearance.

Additionally, in October 2025, Medicus treated the first patient in its SKNJCT-004 study, which is ongoing in the United Arab Emirates.

In November 2025, Medicus received full approvals from the UK Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency, Health Research Authority and Wales Research Ethics Committee to expand SKNJCT-003.

Takeda’s zasocitinib has shown strong rates of skin clearance, as well as other benefits, for adults with moderate-to-severe plaque psoriasis (PsO).

Psoriasis is a chronic immune-mediated inflammatory disease caused
by skin cells multiplying too quickly. PsO is the most common form of psoriasis, and is characterised by patches of itchy, scaly and painful skin. Areas of the body where psoriatic plaques commonly form include the scalp, face, arms and elbows, legs, knees, torso, genitals, nails and skin folds.

Around 64 million people live with psoriasis worldwide, and about 80-90% of those have PsO.

The LATITUDE phase 3 studies of zasocitinib demonstrated its superiority over placebo on both co-primary endpoints at week 16. A significant response rate was seen as early as week 4, and continued to increase through to week 24. Additionally, the studies met all ranked secondary endpoints compared to both placebo and treatment with apremilast.

The safety and tolerability profiles of zasocitinib were found to be comparable with prior studies, and no new safety signals were identified.