About Aktuelle Dermatologie

Aktuelle Dermatologie

Aktuelle Dermatologie is a German-language specialist journal for dermatology, venereology and allergology, published in Stuttgart by the Georg Thieme Verlag. Appearing ten times a year, it combines practice-oriented continuing medical education with scientific articles and professional policy coverage, addressing dermatologists in clinics and private practice. The journal publishes original and review articles, reports on the international specialist literature, case reports and CME training modules — through which subscribers can earn continuing-education points — and is indexed in EMBASE/Excerpta Medica, the Emerging Sources Citation Index and SCOPUS.

Overview

Aktuelle Dermatologie serves the working dermatologist: the physician who needs to stay current with research, maintain mandatory continuing education, and follow the professional and health-policy developments affecting the specialty. Its editorial formula balances three functions. First, it is a continuing-education journal: CME-certified training articles deliver compact specialist knowledge, with subscribers able to earn up to fifteen CME points per year through the Thieme CME portal. Second, it is a scientific journal: original papers, reviews and case reports present research findings and clinical experience. Third, it is a professional journal: coverage of dermatological professional policy — reimbursement, regulation, the organization of dermatological care — addresses the economic and political framework of the specialty.

The journal's scope spans the full breadth of the field: inflammatory skin diseases, skin cancer and dermato-oncology, allergology, venereology, pediatric dermatology, aesthetic dermatology and dermatological surgery, among others. Its hybrid publishing model combines subscription access with open-access options for authors, and its digital presence on Thieme's e-journal platforms gives subscribers access to the complete archive. With around 695,000 full-text uses per year, the journal's content reaches well beyond its subscriber base into the wider medical readership.

History

Aktuelle Dermatologie is published by the Georg Thieme Verlag, one of Germany's leading medical and scientific publishing houses, headquartered in Stuttgart. Thieme's journal program spans the medical specialties, and the "Aktuelle" series — practice-oriented journals for dermatology, cardiology, urology, rheumatology and other fields — forms a distinctive part of it: journals designed to bring the practicing specialist up to date efficiently, rather than to serve as primary research outlets alone.

The journal developed within the transformation of German medical publishing from print-dominated to digital-hybrid. Where earlier generations of dermatologists received their continuing education primarily through print issues and congresses, Aktuelle Dermatologie now operates across print, e-journal, eRef app and CME portal — the training articles linked directly to online testing and point management. The journal's indexing in international databases (EMBASE, SCOPUS, Emerging Sources Citation Index) reflects its standing as a citable scientific publication, while its modest impact factor of 0.1 is typical of practice-oriented specialist journals whose primary mission is education rather than high-impact research.

Through the COVID-19 pandemic and the subsequent digitalization push in medical education, the journal maintained its publishing rhythm and expanded its digital services, with recent articles — such as August 2026 contributions on lipedema surgery and hidradenitis suppurativa treatment — demonstrating continuous editorial production at the forefront of dermatological topics. The pandemic years also accelerated the shift toward digital continuing education across German medicine, as presence-based training events were cancelled and physicians turned to journals and online portals for their mandatory CME points — a shift that strengthened the position of journals like Aktuelle Dermatologie that combine reading with certifiable training.

Coverage and Content

Each issue combines several standing content types. The CME-Fortbildungsbeiträge (continuing-education articles) are the journal's signature: didactically prepared reviews of clinically relevant topics, each linked to an online test through which readers earn CME points. Originalarbeiten (original papers) present new research findings; Übersichtsarbeiten (reviews) synthesize the state of knowledge on specific topics; Referate der internationalen Fachliteratur (reports on international literature) distill important publications from the global dermatology literature for German readers; and Kasuistiken (case reports) present instructive disease and treatment courses from practice.

Professional policy coverage addresses the framework conditions of dermatological practice: developments in reimbursement, quality assurance, the organization of care, and the positions of the specialty's professional associations. "Tipps und Tricks" formats deliver practical clinical pearls, and interviews with leading representatives of the field give the journal its personalities. The mix is deliberately practical: the publisher's description promises everything the dermatologist needs for everyday professional life, with training "as it should be" — relevant, compact and applicable.

The journal's article portfolio tracks the specialty's evolution: biologic therapies for psoriasis and atopic dermatitis, advances in dermato-oncology, new approaches to chronic inflammatory diseases, and the growing interface of dermatology with allergology and aesthetic medicine. The hybrid model allows selected articles to appear open access, widening their reach. For the practicing dermatologist, the journal's value lies in this curation: from the flood of international publications, the editors select and prepare what matters for German clinical practice, translating global research into locally applicable knowledge.

Organization and Ownership

Aktuelle Dermatologie is published by the Georg Thieme Verlag KG, the Stuttgart-based medical and scientific publishing house. Thieme is one of the major German-language publishers for medicine, with a journal portfolio of around two hundred titles spanning the clinical specialties, plus books, digital knowledge products and continuing-education platforms. The journal operates within Thieme's dermatology publishing program, with editorial leadership drawn from the specialty's academic and clinical community — the standard model for German medical journals, in which practicing professors serve as editors alongside the publisher's professional editorial staff.

The commercial model is the medical-journal standard: institutional and personal subscriptions (print with online access), single-article sales, and open-access publication fees (article processing charge of 3,390 euros) for authors choosing the hybrid open-access route. Advertising from pharmaceutical and medical-device companies targeting dermatologists provides additional revenue, sold under the pharmaceutical industry's regulatory framework for professional advertising. The CME business — training modules linked to point certification — is both an editorial service and a commercial pillar, reflecting the mandatory continuing-education requirements of German physicians. Every licensed physician in Germany must demonstrate ongoing training to the medical chambers, and journals that bundle reading with certifiable points occupy a privileged position in that system. For Thieme, the CME infrastructure built around journals like Aktuelle Dermatologie also supports the broader eRef and Thieme Connect platforms, creating network effects across the publisher's medical portfolio.

Digital Presence

The journal's digital home is its Thieme e-journal platform, where subscribers access current issues and the complete archive of all issues published since 2000. The eRef app extends access to mobile devices with offline reading, serving physicians who consult the literature between patients or on the ward. The Thieme CME portal manages the training side: readers complete the online tests linked to CME articles, earn and administer their points, and track their continuing-education progress — a fully digital workflow from article to certified points.

Selected content is discoverable through the publisher's portals and indexing in EMBASE, SCOPUS and the Emerging Sources Citation Index, which bring the journal's articles to international researchers. The connect.thieme.com platform presents the journal's profile, metrics and open-access options to authors considering submission. For a practice-oriented specialist journal, this digital infrastructure is now the primary delivery channel: the print issues anchor the brand and the reading habit, but the e-journal, the app and the CME portal are where the journal meets its readers' daily professional lives — at the desk, in the clinic, on call, and in the quiet hour of evening study that keeps a specialty current.