Dockside: Doctors by your side
MEMBER SPOTLIGHT: Dockside Dermatology
How Dr. Lesley Sutherland and Dr. Stephanie Clements built Dockside Dermatology into a practice where your doctor feels like a neighbor.
Dr. Lesley Sutherland had been practicing dermatology for six years when she decided to move in a different direction. She had grown up watching both her parents run small businesses, and being a small business owner herself had always been the dream. She and Dr. Stephanie Clements — both physicians and both owners — built a practice their way.
Bringing the doctor back
For Sutherland, the main point was to ensure care is in the doctor’s hands. “[We’re] bringing the doctor back as the one that’s making decisions about the patient’s experience and how they’re treated,” she says. Dockside Dermatology is an all-encompassing practice: most days are general dermatology — skin checks, rashes, acne, warts — but there’s a strong surgical side, too. Clements is a Mohs surgeon, performing a specialized skin-cancer surgery for the face, hands, and feet right in the office. Add a full cosmetic menu — lasers, microneedling, Botox, filler, ear piercing, and light therapy — and patients rarely have to be referred out. They can stay in one place.
“We’re near the water, but it’s also like the doctor is by your side.”
A name with two meanings
The name came from a happy bit of wordplay. Dockside nods to the water, of course — but it also means the doctors are by your side. That second meaning is the whole mentality. “We want patients to have a really good experience from the moment you call to when you leave. We want you to feel like we are your community dermatologist,” Sutherland says. She and Clements talk about treating patients like family and friends — accessible, familiar, and genuinely glad you came in.
Go ahead, enjoy the sun
Plenty of Annapolitans live on the water, and Sutherland is right there with them — she’s a devoted boater. That’s exactly why she bristles at the finger-wagging some patients brace for. “We’re going to go out in the boat. We’re going to go out in the sun, but how can we do it in a way where we’re coming in and having skin checks?” she says. Her focus is prevention and early detection: photodynamic light therapy, smart sun habits, and catching anything early. It’s personal, too — she’s been the patient, having had melanoma herself, and she treats people the way she’d want to be treated.
Roll with the punches
“There’s no failures. They’re unfortunate lessons that you have to learn, and then there are good lessons that you learn.”
Ask what she’d tell her younger self and the fear of starting out is the first thing she names. “Don’t be afraid of failures, and don’t be afraid of bad things happening,” she says. Taking things day by day, she’s found, is what turns hard moments into something useful — and into the kind of empathy that makes the business better.
A team of 32
For all the lasers and tools, the resource Sutherland says she couldn’t run the practice without is her people — a staff of 32 and growing. Building and leading a team that size has been one of the most demanding parts of the job — and one of the most important. “When you are wearing your heart truly on your sleeve with this business, and then you’re hiring someone to reflect that, it’s a really, really important thing to us,” she says. The team is hired for, and built around, patient satisfaction. Working hard on staff satisfaction is a key ingredient, too — team activities, from Blue Angels outings to participating in West Annapolis’s Oktoberfest, help protect their staff culture.
Home, at last
A new chapter is the one Sutherland’s most excited about: a second office in West Annapolis, just steps from Weems Creek. For her, it’s a homecoming. “It’s honestly been my dream to be in Annapolis,” she says — she’s from here, and grew up in Eastport. Her roots here run deep in her off-hours, too: a lifelong boater, she spends her free time out on the water with a camera, documenting the boats and the Chesapeake Bay she loves. More than location, it’s about belonging. “We feel like this is a true neighborhood of offices,” she says, and being part of it — Oktoberfest, community events, neighbors — is the point.
At Dockside Dermatology, the water’s close, the door’s open, and the doctors are, as promised, by your side.
Find Dockside Dermatology
101 Ridgely Avenue, Suite 20, Annapolis, MD 21401 • docksidederm.com
Hours: Monday–Friday, 8 AM–4 PM
An all-encompassing dermatology practice — general, surgical, and cosmetic care under one roof. Physician-owned by Dr. Lesley Sutherland and Dr. Stephanie Clements (Mohs surgery on site). A second location in Millersville.
Social: @docksidederm
