Who should be doing skin checks? Rethinking roles in skin health

Skin cancer prevention and early detection continue to place increasing pressure on primary care and allied health teams. At the same time, the workforce involved in “skin health” is expanding and evolving, raising important questions about roles, scope, and collaboration in everyday practice.

In this episode of Focused Practice Conversations, practice operations expert Matt Woollard speaks with dermatology nurse Jennifer Hookham about how skin health roles are changing in real-world settings. With experience spanning primary care and corporate environments, Jennifer offers a grounded perspective on where the system is heading and what it means for clinicians on the ground.

Rather than focusing on fixed job titles, the conversation explores how skills, training, and demand are reshaping who does what in skin checks, prevention, and early detection.

The episode unpacks:

• How Jennifer’s career path into skin health has evolved over time
• What a modern, prevention-focused skin health role looks like in practice
• How nurses, dermal clinicians, and GPs are working in overlapping spaces
• Where collaboration works well, and where it can break down
• What patients are now expecting from skin health services
• How training and standards are keeping pace with workforce changes
• Where the skin health space may be heading over the next 5–10 years

   

As demand grows, understanding how roles fit together is becoming increasingly important for clinics looking to deliver safe, efficient, and patient-centred skin care. The discussion touches on practical realities, emerging models of care, and what effective teamwork can look like.

Listen to the podcast

Prefer a visual format? Watch this episode on the HealthCert Education YouTube channel.

Next steps in your learning journey

🎓 Short Courses in Skin Cancer
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Podcast playlist

Listen to all episodes in the Focused Practice Conversations series.

Focused Practice Conversations series

HealthCert Education's Focused Practice Conversations podcast series explores how GPs build focused areas of practice, why they chose that path, what changed in their clinic, and whether going deeper into one niche was ultimately worth it.

Hosted by Matt Woollard

Healthcare Entrepreneur & Business Development Consultant

Born and educated in Adelaide, Matt Woollard is a seasoned healthcare entrepreneur with over two decades of experience building, scaling, and transforming healthcare businesses across Australia.

Matt began his healthcare career in 2000 as the second employee of Skin Alert Skin Cancer Clinics, where he worked alongside founder Paul Elmslie to grow the business from the ground up to a network of 14 clinics nationwide over seven years. As Chief Executive Officer of National Skin Cancer Centres, established in 2016, Matt led the business through a period of significant expansion before its successful acquisition by Sonic Clinic Services.

With a deep knowledge of skin cancer medicine, Medicare frameworks, and the operational realities of primary care, Matt's core expertise lies in business development, identifying, structuring, and growing healthcare assets in an increasingly complex and competitive landscape. Today, Matt consults across the broader healthcare sector, partnering with large corporates and private equity firms to develop and de-risk healthcare assets. He remains active in skin cancer medicine and brings the same sharp commercial lens to emerging opportunities in women's and mental health.

Guest: Jennifer Hookham MACN

Founder of The Dermal Health Alliance Pty Ltd & Skin Rehab™ 

Grad Cert Medicine (Skin Cancer), Grad Cert Ed (Tertiary), BHSc (Dermal Therapies), Dip Nursing (Div 2), Dip Dermoscopy, Adv Cert Dermoscopy, Prof Cert Dermsocopy, Adv Cert Dermoscopy (ACCO), Dip BTh (ITEC), Cert IV TAE, Cert III (Pathology Collection)

With 34 years of experience as a skin health professional, Jennifer is a Dermatology Nurse incorporating the qualifications of Dermal Clinician, Dermatoscopist, Melanographer, Enrolled Nurse, Phlebotomist & Educator.

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