Dr. Adewole “Ade” Adamson: Summer skin health and safety
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For many people, Memorial Day weekend kicks off a period of spending more time in the sun and thinking of summer skin protection methods.
On May 23, 2024, SciLine interviewed: Dr. Adewole “Ade” Adamson, a dermatologist and assistant professor of internal medicine at the University of Texas at Austin. See the footage and transcript from the interview below, or select ‘Contents’ on the left to skip to specific questions.
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Introduction
[0:00:19]
ADE ADAMSON: My name is Dr. Ade Adamson and I’m a board certified dermatologist. And I am a assistant professor in the division of dermatology at the University of Texas at Austin Dell Medical School. And I’m a health services researcher whose expertise is in melanoma and understanding how we efficiently and effectively take care of patients that have that specific type of skin cancer.
Interview with SciLine
What can you tell us about the link between sun exposure and skin cancer?
[0:00:52]
ADE ADAMSON: There have been many, many studies that have shown people that are exposed to high levels of sunlight or high levels of ultraviolet rays have a higher risk or a higher chance of developing skin cancer.
What types of skin damage can result from sun exposure?
[0:01:18]
ADE ADAMSON: There are a lot of different types of damage that can result from too much sun exposure. One is skin cancer, another is premature aging. Another is what’s called hyperpigmentation, or darkening of the skin, and causing blotches and spots.
How does getting a tan compare to getting a sunburn, in terms of damage and risk of cancer?
[0:01:46]
ADE ADAMSON: When your skin becomes tan, that’s evidence of some damage. Right? So even with a mild tan, now I would say it is not as dangerous as having a full on sunburn—particularly a blistering sunburn—but the tanning process itself and the reaction to your skin to the sun is in itself, creating damage that will speed up aging. That will potentially increase your risk of skin cancer. But what I often tell people is that what you really want to avoid is sunburns. Because those have been most strongly linked to your risk of developing skin cancer.
How can people reduce their risk of getting too much sun exposure?
[0:02:42]
ADE ADAMSON: There are a lot of ways to reduce your risk of too much sun exposure. One is being very strategic about the times of day that you go out. Minimizing activities between, you know, 10 in the morning, and 3 or 4 in the afternoon. Other ways include the application of sunscreen regularly, which helps block some of the damaging effects of ultraviolet radiation from the sun. You could also wear sun-protective clothing as a way to reduce some of the risks associated with sun exposure. And I would say that depending on what activity you’re going to be involved in, using a combination of those approaches is a way in which to reduce the risks of too much sun exposure.
Does skin tone affect a person’s vulnerability to sun damage?
[0:03:37]
ADE ADAMSON: While the data has shown that—and research has shown—that high levels of ultraviolet radiation or too much sun exposure is related to skin cancer, this is not necessarily the case for people of all different skin types. People of darker skin types, folks of African descent as an example, they have much lower risk of developing skin cancer, although the risk does exist, and that development of skin cancer is usually not associated with sun exposure. And so a one-size-fits-all approach around recommendations for reducing sun exposure to stop skin cancer is erroneous. But there are benefits to people with darker skin types reducing the amount of sun exposure that they have, including premature aging, hyperpigmentation. And people of all shades can in fact get sunburned, although people that are darker tend to have to be in the sun much longer in order to get burned than those that are lighter skin.
What can you tell us about claims that sunscreen harms human health?
[0:04:49]
ADE ADAMSON: There has been no strong evidence supporting sunscreen being directly harmful to human health.
How should people decide between chemical and physical sunscreens?
[0:05:08]
ADE ADAMSON: What people should be most focused on is the SPF number that they see on sunscreen bottles, which will tell you how much protection a sunscreen may offer. Now both chemical and physical sunscreens are both safe to use. And they both can offer broad-spectrum coverage and protection. I think what people need to focus most on is which sunscreens that have adequate SPF, so SPF 30 or above, feel good on their skin, and will feel good enough for them to use regularly. Right, because if you use, say, a physical sunscreen that you may feel like provides you have more protection, but it feels horrible going on, you’re not going to wear it. And so it will be useless if it’s in the bottle.
What can you tell us about guidelines for detecting skin cancer?
[0:06:10]
ADE ADAMSON: There are no widely accepted skin cancer screening guidelines in the United States. This is an area of active investigation. It’s an area of interest of mine, but I would recommend to people is that if they have any worrying spot—a mole that’s growing, changing, itching, bleeding—that they try to schedule an appointment with their local board-certified dermatologist, and if one is not available, try to go to their primary care physician to have it evaluated.
What can you tell us about the present and future use of artificial intelligence in skin cancer detection?
[0:06:52]
ADE ADAMSON: Artificial intelligence is technology that will probably have a profound effect on the delivery of healthcare. One area of interest is using computer vision, which is a type of artificial intelligence where you can program an algorithm in order to detect things that are skin cancers versus not skin cancers. There have been some remarkable studies showing that you can design algorithms that can detect skin cancers to the level of a board-certified dermatologist, but these studies have been done basically in the laboratory format and not actually in the real world. And currently, there is only one FDA-approved device for the detection of skin cancer that has artificial intelligence within it. And currently, it is not widely used. And I would also say that some consumer products that claim that they can detect skin cancer with high fidelity or high likelihood those tend to be pretty problematic, and they often don’t actually hold up under scrutiny.