Laser treatment times

Hi Sean,

Because I have no idea as to the type, frequency, or output of the laser you purchased it’s an impossible question to answer. The simplest answer would be that the manufacturer should be well aware of the ability of the machine to treat injuries, and to follow their advice.

However the effectiveness of a laser to treat injuries depends mainly on the output of the laser diodes, and the number of diodes that are clustered in the treatment head as to how large an area it covers.

For a worthwhile healing effect of muscle or ligament damage, and depending on the type of injury being treated, it is generally accepted that 2 to 8 Joule of laser energy needs to be absorbed by each 2x2 cm area of tissue at each treatment session.

Therefore the time spent treating each area depends entirely on the output of the laser.

Most injuries will require from 5 to 10 treatments.
It should also be noted that the joule output as described is based on a laser with a continuous beam, not a pulsed beam, as this dramatically reduces the joule output.

You will have to check the specifications of your laser, and this will then provide the best guide to treatment times.

Cheers,
Tom

Edit

Just further to the above it should be noted that because the effectiveness of the treatment depends entirely on the amount of laser energy being absorbed it’s important that the treatment head is held stationary firmly against the skin unless it’s being used as an open wound treatment, and the less hair in the area the better.

In other words moving it around over the injury as you would with an ultrasound will do nothing, or at most very little, towards healing a muscle or ligament injury.

Hi Tom

The laser I described above has a 808nm 450mW cluster head.