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Introduction: Approximately 80,000 cases of skin cancer are diagnosed annually in France. The management of these cancers can occur in both university hospital centers and ambulatory surgery centers. Limited data exist regarding the epidemiology of cutaneous cancers treated through ambulatory surgery centers. The objective of our study is to describe the epidemiological characteristics of cutaneous cancers managed in a tertiary ambulatory surgery center., Methods: This is a retrospective, single-center observational study. The included patients were those who underwent surgical excision of one or more skin cancers within the maxillofacial department of a tertiary ambulatory surgery center. Clinical, therapeutic, histopathological, and follow-up data (additional surgery if margins were not clear, progression, recurrence, second cancer…) were collected., Results: Among the n = 1931 patients operated for a head and neck skin tumor from September 2018 to July 2022, n = 426 (22 %) were diagnosed with cancer upon histological analysis. The median age was 76 years (31-100), with a male-to-female ratio of 1/1. The most frequent locations were the nose (23 %) and cheek (20 %). Ten percent of patients had dual-site skin cancer at initial diagnosis. The most common histological types were basal cell carcinoma (77 %) and squamous cell carcinoma (18 %). Surgical treatment primarily consisted of "excision-reconstruction with local flap" (51 %) or "excision-suture" (34 %). Resection margins were mostly clear (65 %), and only six patients (2 %) experienced local recurrence or progression during follow-up., Conclusions: Skin cancers are prevalent in ambulatory practice. Surgical treatment allows for effective control of the cancer. Photoprotection, particularly in immunocompromised patients, remains crucial for prevention., Competing Interests: Declaration of Competing Interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this article., (Copyright © 2023 Elsevier Masson SAS. All rights reserved.)

A plethora of intrinsic and environmental factors have been shown to influence the length of telomeres, the protector of chromosome ends. Despite the growing interest in infection-telomere interactions, there is very limited knowledge on how transmissible cancers influence telomere maintenance. An emblematic example of transmissible cancer occurs in the Tasmanian devil (Sarcophilus harrisii), whose populations have been dramatically reduced by infectious cancer cells. To investigate associations between telomere dynamics and the transmissible cancer, we used longitudinal data from a Tasmanian devil population that has been exposed to the disease for over 15 years. We detected substantial temporal variation in individual telomere length (TL), and a positive significant association between TL and age, as well as a marginally significant trend for devils with devil facial tumour disease (DFTD) having longer telomeres. A proportional hazard analysis yielded no significant effect of TL on the development of DFTD. Like previous studies, we show the complexity that TL dynamics may exhibit across the lifetime of organisms. Our work highlights the importance of long-term longitudinal sampling for understanding the effects of wildlife diseases on TL., (© 2022 The Authors. Molecular Ecology published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.)

Understanding the effects of wildlife diseases on populations requires insight into local environmental conditions, host defence mechanisms, host life-history trade-offs, pathogen population dynamics, and their interactions. The survival of Tasmanian devils (Sarcophilus harrisii) is challenged by a novel, fitness limiting pathogen, Tasmanian devil facial tumour disease (DFTD), a clonally transmissible, contagious cancer. In order to understand the devils' capacity to respond to DFTD, it is crucial to gain information on factors influencing the devils' immune system. By using RT-qPCR, we investigated how DFTD infection in association with intrinsic (sex and age) and environmental (season) factors influences the expression of 10 immune genes in Tasmanian devil blood. Our study showed that the expression of immune genes (both innate and adaptive) differed across seasons, a pattern that was altered when infected with DFTD. The expression of immunogbulins IgE and IgM:IgG showed downregulation in colder months in DFTD infected animals. We also observed strong positive association between the expression of an innate immune gene, CD16, and DFTD infection. Our results demonstrate that sampling across seasons, age groups and environmental conditions are beneficial when deciphering the complex ecoevolutionary interactions of not only conventional host-parasite systems, but also of host and diseases with high mortality rates, such as transmissible cancers., (© 2022 The Authors. Molecular Ecology published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.)