Anyone else had this problem?

Hair Removal Methods Laser hair removal
#1

I’ve had hair removal done twice to my arms with the Lightsheer system. The first time was at 30 jouls, the second at 40.

One month to the day of my last treatment, I began to get broken blood vessels in the area that was treated. They would start out as painful raised bumps the size of a quarter, and then would spread out causing circular bruises that were about 3" in diamater. My arms were covered with them. The broken blood vessels continued for about two weeks before stopping. It took about 6 weeks for all the bruising to go away.

I paid for three treatments, and am very leary to get the last one done, even though I think I need it. The doctor’s office where it was done tells me they’ve never heard of this type of reaction before, and my own doctor ran tests and determined nothing else was wrong with me that could possible cause this.

Has this happened to anyone else? I’ve also had hair removal in other areas without a problem.

#2

My mom has had problems with her veins since she had her treatment on her legs 8 months ago, although hers is a lot more severe. The doctors hadn’t heard of this happening before but ran tests and found out she had nerve damage and some of her veins were dead. Please see my other post… has anyone had this problem??? (1/7/04) i’m trying to figure out if anyone has heard of this happening too.

#3

I know you both talked to your doctors about these problems and it seems like there are no logical answers for you from them or other consumers, so I had an idea that you might want to pursue with a little work.

Maybe you can describe these experiences with the scientists/doctors that are currently doing laser hair removal research. One place you can find these researchers, is to go to www.pubmed.com website. Type in “laser hair removal” and you will see many authors of current articles on laser hair removal.

For instance, Tina Alster from the Washington Institute of Dermatologic Laser Surgery might be a start. She has been using and reporting on lasers for several years. There is an e-mail address under an article by Lanigan,SW that you could use for a contact. Rox Anderson,MD (don’t know if he still does laser hair removalresearch- he’s like the father of laser) and Elliot Battle,M.D. are some other biggies that may be able to explain your situations logically. If my memory is correct, they are out of the Wellman Institute at Harvard. Don’t hold me to this, but it might be a hint to start somewhere.

My point is, you may have to get answers from the laser reseachers and go on a hunt for how to contact them and then hope they respond to you.

There may not be any consumers out there that have had these problems, or are not reading this site, but perhaps these physicians have some sort of clearinghouse advantage where they hear about concerns and study them.

#4

Thanks, I’ll check that out :slight_smile:

#5

Have you perhaps been on any vitamins, supplements or medications that could cause blood thinning? Laser hair removal energy only penetrates a few millimeters into this skin, so it is difficult to postulate how this could affect the deep tissue where blood vessels of this magnitude are located. The Lightsheer machine does cause a lot of scabbing and pigmentation with treatment, which often does take several months to resolve. The development of these vessels could also be coincidental - it is possible that you would have developed these regardless of laser treatment. Too high a fluence may have been used for your treatment. Try to find a practitioner with a 1064nm (NdYag) machine - this is much more forgiving of the skin at high fluence levels. Keep us posted - :wink: