We have been taking mandatory photos of all treated areas since the advent of affordable digital photography. Prior to that, only in difficult cases due to the cost.
We believe that the treatment of telangiectasis, feeder veins, reticular veins and varicose veins should always be began with a thorough photo documentation.
That is the only way to follow the treatment outcome but photo documentation is time consuming and therefore increases the price of the treatment.
Do you take pictures in every single case?
Yes, since you I use the term 'aesthetic', it is appearance that is the indicator of success or failure. I'm not from your field of medical imaging, but as for you, my reputation relies on aesthetics and visual pleasure, but also accuracy. I have photographed artworks for a living for forty years. I agree with your approach, and yes, digital imaging makes documentation accessible and affordable. I am struck by the fact that your images
Yes, since you use the term 'aesthetic', photographic documentation is obviously of benefit. In the example you provide a 'before and after', side-by-side comparison in which the relative differences are made more apparent by the consistency of lighting and angle of view. I am not in your field of medicine, but aesthetics and 'pleasing the eye' are important in my work of the last forty years, making photographic reproductions of artworks, both on film and with digital imaging. The advent of the latter has certainly brought advances.
However, I note that in your example, no calibration appears (it may have been cropped). Archaeologists use measurement scales in every photograph. I use a greyscale, process colour patches, and more recently Macbeth colour chart and correction software to ensure the colour of the original is reproduced accurately. Even digital imaging cannot reproduce all colours as the eye sees it.
Furthermore, the example you include appears to be shot under broad fluorescent lighting. There may be textural skin defects that do not show up in this lighting, but which would be very apparent under more contrasty, oblique point-source light (e.g. off-camera flash), or under lighting of a different hue or colour-balance (for example the blue light that public transport providers use to frustrate attempts to intravenously inject illicit drugs on their vehicles). Accordingly, daylight reveals quite different aspects of a subject's colour than does tungsten or LED lighting.
I recommend deploying colour and measurement calibration, and of different qualities of light source direction, intensity, focus and hue, during your documentation sessions if you are not already doing so. It will still be cheap, even if it requires fractionally more time, and will provide further evidence of the effectiveness of your treatments.
Very Very Very interesting James Martin McArdle!
This photos were taken with fluorescent light from the Flebosuite Room, a little indirect light from the windows and an external flash pointing to a white ceiling. I have ben wondering why some of my old photos taken with PhotoFlood 500W are so much better. See the example bellow.
What type of colour scale would you suggest?
Yes the floodlight gives detail that is certainly more informative! Clearly effective treatment of varicose veins! Kodak make a useless colour separation guide that is a reference for printers reproducing photographs in CMYK inks. A more durable version is the DGK waterproof version.
http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/26662-REG/Kodak_1527654_Color_Separation_Guide_and.html
http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1014565-REG/dgk_color_tools_wdkk_bubble_bag_1.html
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