Is there anything that can be done to patch this, short of replacing the whole door panel? I might even consider recoloring the exposed white area so it's less distracting.

I was told by one person that on early model years, this soft touch material had chemistry issues and would eventually start gooifying all over the car including on the dashboard -- right now this is the only spot that has an issue though.

 

yeah, thats the melted dash. There is a stickydash filler or padded dash filler, both of which work well, the only difficult part is getting the texture 100% as it tends to go on smooth. Once you fill it in, i suggest an adhesive vinyl wrap to cover the entire area and prevent anymore degredation.