What Health Problems Benefit from Laser Therapy?
Biological Effects of Laser Therapy
How Does High Power Laser Therapy Compare with "Cold Laser" Therapy?
Research Studies on Laser Therapy
- Pain Relief
- Nerve Pain
- Arthritis Relief
- Connective Tissue Repair
- Tendonitis
- Soft Tissue
- Spinal Cord Injuries
- TMJ
- Wound Healing
About Laser Therapy:: History of Laser Therapy
Early History
Albert Einstein is often credited for the development of Laser Theory. He used the term “stimulated emission” in his theory Zur Quantum Theories der Strahlung which was published in 1916.
The effects of red light on physiologic cell function were known as early as 1880, but the clinical benefits of laser therapy were not known until 1967.
A few years after the first working laser was invented in 1967, Endre Mester at the Semmelweis University in Budapest, Hungary, conducted tests on mice to determine whether or not laser exposure caused cancer. In his experiments he shaved the hair off the backs of mice and divided the subjects into two groups. He exposed one group to laser treatment using a low-power ruby laser (extremely low power compared to today’s advanced technology!) while the control group received no laser therapy.
Dr. Mester was surprised to learn that the laser-treated mice did not develop cancer. In fact, he discovered that the hair grew back much more quickly in the mice that received the laser treatment as compared to the non-treatment control group! That was how “photobiostimulation” was discovered.
Low power lasers became commercially available for the treatment of pain in the late 1970’s and have been widely utilized around the globe by doctors, chiropractors, physical therapists and nurses ever since.
Laser Technology Marches On
The early lasers were only slightly more powerful than modern keychain-sized laser pointers (about 5 milliWatts or mW) that can be purchased for a few dollars at any office supply store. The extremely low power of these lasers prevented the lasers from penetrating the skin. This limited early treatment effects to only skin conditions.
It wasn’t until the FDA approved the Class IIIB lasers for therapeutic use that the miraculous benefits of laser therapy really became recognized. Class IIIB lasers (commonly called “Cold Lasers” or Low-Level Laser Therapy [LLLT]) were limited to 500mW (about 100 times more powerful than a modern-day laser pointer) of power which allowed them to treat conditions just below the skin. This opened up the field of laser therapy to other tissues including ligaments, tendons and muscles that were located very close to the skin.
In 2006 the FDA created the 4th classification of therapeutic lasers – known as Class IV Lasers. This was the birth of HPLT – High Power Laser Therapy. The FDA classified Class IV lasers as operating between 500mW (Class IIIB) and 7,500mW. This is about 15 times more powerful than the previous generation “Cold Lasers”. This means that the latest generation of laser therapy can penetrate 15 times deeper than the older laser units and deliver results in a fraction of the time. This allows the clinician to treat almost any tissue in the body.
With the advent of the Class IV lasers the previous generation “Cold Lasers” are now considered woefully obsolete.
There is only one laser therapy unit currently available that is capable of operating at the maximum allowed by the FDA – the Avicenna High Power Laser Therapy Unit.
