Clinical diagnosis and management of suspicious pigmented skin lesions--a survey of GPs.

BACKGROUND

The ability of general practitioners to make important clinical decisions about the diagnosis and management of skin lesions is poorly understood.

METHODS

A questionnaire on the diagnosis and management of eight photographed skin lesions was sent to 150 GPs in southeast Queensland.

RESULTS

The questionnaire was completed by 114 GPs (response rate 77%). General practitioners' provisional diagnoses and management of photographed skin lesions were mostly or always correct, and there was general high consistency between diagnosis and intended management. Pigmented seborrhoeic keratoses were the most difficult lesions for GPs to diagnose correctly. Whether a lesion was different to usual moles appears to have the strongest association with clinical diagnosis.

DISCUSSION

The high ability of GPs as measured in this artificial study is encouraging. The strong association between identifying moles that appear different to usual and correct clinical diagnoses suggest that unless GPs can increase the number of skin lesions they see as part of their typical workload, their clinical ability may not increase further.