The 2025 AAD Meeting is Underway | AAD 2025

The eyes of the dermatology world turned to Orlando, Florida, today as the 2025 meeting of the American Academy of Dermatology began in earnest.

Technically, the meeting began yesterday, but today was the first day with a full slate of sessions. The subjects covered included onychomycosis, gastrointestinal inflammatory disorders' cutaneous manifestations, and the use of artificial intelligence in the diagnosis of uncommon dermatological conditions.

Seemai Desai, M.D.

“There is just so much new content that is happening at this meeting,” said Seemai R. Desai, M.D., president of the academy and a dermatologist in Plano, Texas, in an interview prior to the meeting, which is being held at the Orange County Convention Center.

Desai is scheduled to lead off this afternoon’s opening ceremony of the meeting, which features a fireside chat between him and Martha Stewart, the home décor entrepreneur and media personality. Stewart, who is 83, has talked often about her skin routine and looking younger than her age.

Martha Stewart

Desai said presentations about new treatments for inflammatory skin conditions in the “hot topics” and sessions will be especially notable. “It will be like you will be watching press releases all day long,” he said.

The late-breakers session—a forum for the presentation of new clinical trial results that the meeting’s organizers choose to highlight—tomorrow morning includes presentations of phase 3 trial results for Johnson & Johnson’s icotrokinra, an oral interleukin-23 receptor blocker, as treatment for moderate-to-severe plaque psoriasis; long-term phase 2 trial results of Alumis’ ESK-001, an inhibitor of tyrosine kinase 2, also as a treatment for moderate-to-severe plaque psoriasis; and phase 3 trial results for Opzelura (ruxolitinib cream) as a treatment for prurigo nodularis.

The scheduled speakers at the plenary session on Sunday include Desai; Marta Jane Van Beek, M.D., M.P.H., a University of Iowa dermatologic surgeon; Aviv Regev, Ph.D., M.Sc., head and executive vice president of Genentech's research and early development; Rachel Clark, M.D., Ph.D., a researcher and dermatologist at Mass General Brigham in Boston; and Pearl E. Grimes, M.D., a vitiligo and pigmentation expert in Los Angeles.

The full-fledged meeting ends on Monday afternoon, and it officially draws to a close on Tuesday after just two sessions Tuesday morning. A total of 330 sessions are scheduled over the meeting's five days.