Doha, Qatar: In 2024 and 2025, two-thousand older adults received specialised care through the Geriatric Dermatology (GeriDerm) Clinic, a unique collaborative service delivered in partnership with Hamad Medical Corporation’s Rumailah Hospital and Department of Dermatology and Venereology.
The clinic provides an innovative model of integrated care, redefining how skin conditions in older adults are diagnosed, managed and understood within the broader context of ageing and chronic disease.
The GeriDerm Clinic brings together geriatric medicine and dermatology within a single, coordinated care pathway, recognising that skin changes in older adults are often key indicators of underlying systemic illness rather than isolated conditions. By combining expertise across specialities, the clinic enables precision diagnosis, timely intervention and holistic care for some of the most clinically complex patients in the health system.
Operating as a structured, weekly interdisciplinary clinic, GeriDerm delivers same-visit, joint clinical decision-making.
This approach is particularly critical for older adults living with frailty, multiple long-term conditions, and prescribed multiple medications, where delayed or misinterpreted diagnoses can lead to avoidable complications and hospital admissions.
In 2024 and 2025 alone, the clinic recorded 2,000 patient encounters, reflecting a sustained increase in referrals and a growing role as a tertiary-level service for complex geriatric dermatology care.
Notably, 2025 data demonstrated a higher proportion of female patients, consistent with the epidemiology of chronic inflammatory and autoimmune skin conditions in later life.
The most common conditions managed include autoimmune blistering diseases, pruritus, atopic dermatitis, and complex skin infections. The clinic has also become a national referral point for severe, age-related inflammatory skin disease.
One of the GeriDerm Clinic’s key roles is the early detection of rare and serious conditions. In older adults, these conditions are often missed or mistaken for normal ageing.
Through careful assessment, unusual or long-lasting skin changes are investigated quickly, with timely biopsies and referrals to specialist teams. This helps reduce delays in diagnosis and allows treatment to begin earlier.
By using skin findings to identify wider health concerns, the clinic supports early care planning, safer medication use and well-coordinated follow-up. This approach has improved patient outcomes, helped older adults maintain their independence, and reduced unnecessary hospital visits, showing how integrated, person-centred care can make a real difference for ageing patients.
