Introduction: The Differences of Black Skin

Abstract

Our team has a long history of working in the Detroit, Michigan, area, and we have treated many black-skinned patients from all over the world. What is obvious is that people of color—both African Americans and dark-skinned people in general—have special conditions that are specific to their ethnicity. If clinicians do not have experience with dark-skinned patients, they may not have encountered common conditions that are not often seen in Caucasian or other light-skinned people, and they may not have treated patients from different national and ethnic backgrounds. As a result, they can mistake a normal condition for abnormal, or vice versa. We thought that the best way to deal with this problem is to provide a book that is specific to skin conditions solely in the black population. We chose to use the term “Black Skin” because we encounter many patients across the globe with dark skin, not just African Americans.