What to Look Forward to at the American Academy of Dermatology Annual Meeting 2025

As the American Academy of Dermatology (AAD) 2025 Annual Meeting is beginning this week, the HCPLive editorial team interviewed 4 leading experts in the field of dermatology to describe the elements of AAD to which they are most looking forward.

The meeting is slated for March 7 - 11 in Orlando, Florida, and will feature a variety of sessions on different topics and covering various disease states such as psoriasis, atopic dermatitis, hidradenitis suppurativa (HS), and alopecia areata, as well as cosmetic and aesthetic dermatology discussions. It will also highlight late-breaking data and provide clinicians and health care professionals with the opportunity to network and meet others in the field.

The team spoke with Linda Stein Gold, MD, vice president of the American Academy of Dermatology and the head of the division of dermatology for the Henry Ford Health System, about her views on AAD 2025. We also interviewed Arash Mostaghimi, MD, MPH, an assistant professor of dermatology, the director of the inpatient dermatology consult service, and the co-director of the Complex Medical Dermatology Fellowship at Brigham & Women’s Hospital.

Additionally, the team interviewed Raj Chovatiya, MD, PhD, clinical associate professor of medicine at Rosalind Franklin University Chicago Medical School and the founder and director of the Center for Medical Dermatology + Immunology Research in Chicago. Lastly, we spoke with Brett King, MD, PhD, an associate professor of dermatology at Yale University School of Medicine. All 4 of these speakers highlighted what they are most looking forward to at the conference.

Stein Gold: I'm looking forward to the AAD in general this year. I think it's a great location. When you look at the sessions, they're really full of the latest and the newest in research, whether that's atopic dermatitis, psoriasis, HS, vitiligo, or alopecia. I think there's so much going on, and I think it's going to be a really great meeting.

Mostaghimi: So, despite my academic roots, what I love at AAD is seeing my friends and colleagues from all different places and connecting with trainees, old residents, old medical students, and things along those lines. That's my guilty pleasure. But from a scientific standpoint and a symposium standpoint, it's amazing to look at the progress we've made with new medications across a number of disorders over the last few years, and I look forward to seeing what's coming down the pike to give us better care for our patients.

Chovatia: AAD is everything to everyone. It can be any number of exciting factors. For me, a lot of it stems from just the latest cuts of phase 1, 2, and 3 trials that we've been waiting excitedly to see. As someone who participates in many of these studies and works in them, in many ways, it's always really fun to see the fruition of results. Because sometimes you get a home run, sometimes you hit a double, and sometimes it's a strikeout. That's just the nature of science and clinical investigation. So really, a lot of those late breakers across many different immune-mediated diseases are what's exciting for me.

King: What is so exciting about AAD is that we have everything from educational, 3-hour long and 1-hour long deep dives into disease states. It is a time when you can come and really learn from A - Z about a disease. At the same time, these late-breaking sessions are truly where our future is presented to us. So you have everything from where we're coming from and what we know today to what we're going to be doing in 5 or 10 years. And that's really, for me, the excitement of the AAD.

To stay updated on the late-breaking data and interviews our team covers at AAD 2025, check out our latest updates located at this page.

The quotes contained in this interview summary were edited for the purposes of clarity.