Our History

The International Alliance of Global Health Dermatology (GLODERM) was established in 2018 by the International Foundation for Dermatology (IFD) with the help of GLODERM Co-Founders Dr Claire Fuller (IFD Chair) and Esther Freeman MD, PhD (currently IFD Vice-Chair). GLODERM envisions a world where every individual, regardless of background, has the opportunity to achieve skin health. Our mission is to promote skin health worldwide through enhanced access to care, training, advocacy, capacity building, clinical care, and research.

Since our inception, we have grown from a small group of dedicated global health dermatologists to an international community of more than 1000 members from over 54 countries in six short years. We are immensely proud of what we have accomplished in this time. In 2022 we launched the first-of-its-kind global health dermatology mentorship program focused on building leadership skills for dermatology changemakers dedicated to increasing access to care in under-resourced communities. This includes our first 17 mentee recipients from 14 different countries, hailing from Brazil, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Ecuador, Ethiopia, India, Indonesia, Kenya, Madagascar, Mexico, Rwanda, St Lucia, Tanzania, Vietnam, and Burundi. Our mentees have gone on to start residency programmes, work to fight skin disease stigma in their countries and create outreach programmes impacting thousands of underserved patients.

Our GLODERM Trainee Committee, initially founded by Dr. Sidra Khan and colleagues, has hosted numerous webinars that are freely available on our Youtube channel. The webinars themselves have also served as training opportunities, with our next generation of dermatologists learning how to host virtual seminars with global experts. Our webinars cover an array of relevant and practical topics in global health dermatology ranging from dermatological diseases, their management and emerging treatments, and research like how to conduct a peer review as an example.

We have also strengthened the global community with our annual scientific meetings at the American Academy of Dermatology Annual Meeting, the European Academy of Dermatology and Venereology Annual Meeting, and the World Congress of Dermatology Meeting. We have hosted scientific meetings with wide-ranging themes including neglected tropical diseases, aboriginal health, climate change, and migrant health, among others.

As we continue to expand our global community, we invite you to join us in our endeavour of achieving Skin Health for Everyone, Everywhere.

A Message from the Co-Founder of GLODERM, Dr. Esther Freeman on the Upcoming Year
Dr. Claire Fuller (outgoing Vice Chair GLODERM, Chair of the IFD) and I could not be more excited to introduce you to our incoming Chair of GLODERM, Dr. Kari Wanat, and Vice Chair, Dr.Wendemagegn Enable Yeshanehe, both experienced GLODERM leaders and both mentors in our mentorship program. Dr. Wanat has a long history in global health dermatology and access to care, working in teledermatology and dermatopathology in the USA, Tanzania, and Niger. Dr.Enbiale is a changemaker from Ethiopia who was the first dermatologist in his region, started a residency program in the area, and is also dedicated to large-scale treatment campaigns for neglected tropical diseases. I hope you will join me in welcoming these two outstanding individuals to the Executive Committee, who I know will grow GLODERM in wonderful new directions. Dr. Wingfield Rehmus will continue her tenure as Secretary/Treasurer, for which we are enormously grateful. In the future, our leaders will have a four year leadership cycle.

I would like to thank the GLODERM Executive Committee, including Claire Fuller and Wingfield Rehmus, as well as the Steering Committee for their outstanding work over the past five years. On a personal level, I’m delighted to share that I won’t be going far – I am the incoming Vice Chair of the International Foundation for Dermatology, and will continue to work with GLODERM in my new role.

We are so excited to see what the future of GLODERM brings! It’s been an honor of a lifetime to be on this journey with all of you – there is much work to be done to ensure skin health for everyone,
everywhere, and I can’t imagine a more dedicated group to rise to this challenge.

Dr. Esther Freeman