By Marjory Inglis, health reporter

PATIENTS ACROSS Tayside with skin cancer are getting speedier diagnosis and treatment thanks to a digital revolution.

Others are having their minds put at rest quickly and without lengthy trips to Ninewells Hospital because digital photographs showing worrying moles, lumps or bumps can be ruled out remotely as non-cancerous.

Today, a team led by Ninewells plastic surgeon Howard Stevenson will celebrate the successful introduction of the Tayside Digital Image Referral Project. NHS Tayside’s chief operating officer Gerry Marr will also formally open refurbished plastic surgery facilities including a small operating theatre.

Two years ago the digital image project began working with a few local GP practices, pioneering a system now available in every surgery across the region.

Practice staff use digital cameras to take high-quality pictures that are then sent to Ninewells at the touch of a computer keyboard. Specialists in the hospital’s plastic surgery department access the images and quickly decide whether the patient needs to visit the hospital for treatment or can be reassured immediately their skin problem is non-cancerous.

Mr Stevenson said more than 1200 patients had been treated so far with the results being reviewed and put forward for publication in a specialist journal. He hoped the Tayside project would be a blueprint for other board areas keen to adopt digital image referral.

He said that two years ago the Executive gave his team £100,000 to establish the system in Tayside with a view to testing it more widely. “Many people have tried this and it has not worked out,” he said. “Because of the electronic systems in Tayside being as good as they are, we have been able to make it work.”

His team has collaborated with computer specialists to develop software that standardises background lighting and other factors that could otherwise lead to blurred images and prevent a diagnosis.