Dr. Janellen Smith specializes in the care of patients with Atypical Mole Syndrome, melanoma and other types of skin cancer.  She practices in the Dermatology Clinic in Irvine, California.  She is a member of the UC Irvine Melanoma Group and lectures frequently on melanoma, atypical moles and skin cancer in general.  She recently spoke at the UC Irvine Melanoma Symposium and the American Academy of Dermatology in San Francisco .  She lectures regularly at the medical school and addresses large corporate groups about the dangers of sun exposure and the diagnosis of skin cancer.

Dr Smith graduated from the University of Iowa , School of Medicine in June of 1982.  After medical school, she interned in St Louis and trained in Dermatology at the University of Michigan .  In 1987, she returned to Washington University in St Louis for her fellowship in molecular biology where she cloned and sequenced the gene for collagenase in recessive dystrophic epidermolysis bullosa. 

She began her postgraduate career as an instructor at Washington University later moving to the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis .  At the U of M, she ran the melanoma program and started a multidisciplinary clinic for the long term care of pigmented lesion patients.  She was also the Chief of Dermatology at the Minneapolis VA Medical Center.

In 1997, she was offered a position at UCSF where she sat on the Multidisciplinary Melanoma Board and followed a large number of patients with melanoma and atypical moles.  During that time, she developed an interest in melanoma stem cells in collaboration with Dr Ruby Ghadially.  Dr. Smith moved to UC Irvine in 2006 but commutes back and forth to San Francisco to maintain her association with the stem cell group there. 

Dr. Smith is board certified in Dermatology and a Fellow of the American Academy of Dermatology.  She is a Professor of Dermatology at the UC Irvine School of Medicine where she also teaches residents and fellows in the Dermatology Department there.