Alaska Unified Rural Outreach for Regional Access
AURORA connects local clinics, tribal health organizations, rural hospitals, and primary care teams to Alaska dermatology hubs, so patients can receive specialty guidance without leaving their community whenever clinically appropriate.
AURORA at a glance
How AURORA works
Care starts at the rural health clinic, with the team the patient already knows.
The spoke captures standardized photos and the AURORA minimum data set.
A dermatology hub reviews the case with the interdisciplinary team and the patient. The hub builds a diagnosis and treatment plan, and coordinates prior authorizations and treatment access.
The treatment plan returns to the rural health clinic, which implements it with the patient.
Treatment and monitoring happen close to home at the rural health clinic, with hub support.
Find your path
Reach specialty dermatology through your local clinic, without a long trip away from home whenever care allows.
How AURORA works →Bring specialty dermatology to your community as a spoke site, with training, tools, and hub support behind every case.
Become a spoke site →Support rural access to specialized dermatology care. AURORA welcomes foundations, health systems, tribal health organizations, and grant partners who want to help close the distance for rural Alaskans, through a firewalled, non-promotional model.
See our impact →Why AURORA exists
Psoriasis, hidradenitis suppurativa, atopic dermatitis, and related conditions are whole-body inflammatory diseases. They deserve accurate diagnosis, thoughtful documentation, and targeted treatment plans aimed at longer-term disease control, not just temporary symptom relief with creams or short-term medications.
Across rural and remote Alaska, the nearest dermatologist can be hundreds of miles and several flights away, so conditions go undiagnosed and undertreated for years.
Where a patient lives should not determine whether a treatable disease is caught early. AURORA brings specialty input to the local team instead of asking every patient to travel.
Many chronic inflammatory skin diseases now have more treatment pathways than they did a decade ago. AURORA helps rural teams recognize when a condition needs specialty input, documentation, monitoring, or referral.
Conditions supported
AURORA focuses on systemic immune-mediated diseases that fit the hub-and-spoke model, and it supports general dermatology and urgent triage alongside them.
Building the network
AURORA is recruiting founding spoke sites and developing the training, photo standards, and workflow that make rural teledermatology work. If you serve a rural community, we would like to talk.