Why we exist
A professional home built for a specialty that has grown faster than the infrastructure meant to support it.
Closing a gap in specialty training
Dermatologic disease is common, and dermatologic expertise is scarce. The average wait for a new dermatology appointment now runs over a month nationally, and considerably longer in much of the country, while the multibillion-dollar OTC and cosmetic skincare industry operates with almost no clinical oversight at all. Patients are left to sort evidence from marketing largely on their own.
Pharmacists are already positioned to close that gap. They're the most accessible licensed healthcare professionals in the country — nearly 9 in 10 Americans live within five miles of one — and they're already fielding dermatologic questions constantly, almost always without any dermatology-specific training behind the answer they're giving.
The therapies patients need help navigating span the entire spectrum of the specialty: OTC retinoids and sunscreens on one end, complex biologics on the other, with prior authorization, injection technique, and adverse-effect monitoring in between. Pharmacists already do this work, in community pharmacy, specialty pharmacy, and compounding, without a dedicated professional home behind it. Nearly every other clinical specialty has a pharmacist society. Dermatology hasn't, until now. We exist to be that professional home: for pharmacists working across clinical dermatology and formulation science, and for the allied professionals and industry partners who work alongside them, with programs, publications, and standards shaped by the members who join.
This is already the direction the field is moving. Ontario added acne, dermatitis, and impetigo to the list of conditions its pharmacists can prescribe for in 2023. Idaho pharmacists have held broad, independent prescribing authority for minor, self-limiting conditions since 2019, skin conditions included. Tennessee expanded independent pharmacist prescriptive authority again in 2024, one of a growing list of states to do so. The regulatory groundwork for a larger pharmacist role in dermatology already exists elsewhere — dermatology pharmacy just needs the professional infrastructure to catch up to it. Our Resource Library has the full case, with citations.
A community across the specialty
Clinical & Community Pharmacists
Practicing in dermatology clinics, specialty pharmacy, and compounding settings.
Researchers & Educators
Advancing formulation science and training the next generation of practitioners.
Allied Professionals & Industry Partners
Working alongside pharmacists in dermatology-adjacent research, manufacturing, and care.
Why I started this
I started this to connect pharmacists working across every side of dermatology: community practice, industry, and OTC and cosmetics, who didn't have anywhere to talk to each other about it.
Dermatological expertise is scarce and unevenly distributed, while the multi-billion-dollar beauty and wellness industry is largely unregulated, leaving patients to sort evidence from marketing on their own. Community pharmacists, often patients' most accessible healthcare professional, are an underused resource for closing that gap.
Dermatology is barely organized as a specialty within pharmacy, and misinformation fills the space where guidance should be.
Who's involved
What guides us
Evidence First
Clinical and formulation guidance held to the same evidentiary standard as any other specialty practice.
Open to the Whole Specialty
Membership built for pharmacists at every career stage: student, resident, and practicing professional alike.
Built Together
A Society shaped by its members, not handed down from the top.
Be part of what we're building
Members help set the Society's direction and shape what it becomes.