After 25 years in the electrology profession and the experience of seeing thousands of patients with all sorts of hair problems I am extremely familiar with the anguish of the patients with this problem. This board and others have posted comments about the potential seriousness of the medical problem that causes the hair to grow.
It boggles my mind why patients try to treat themselves when the treatments are covered by their medical insurance. In addition, there are now articles in medical journals about the fact hair removal lasers can cause MELANOMAS (a potentially fatal skin cancer). “Lentigo Maligna” is the name given to benign brown spots and freckles that CONVERT to MELANOMAS when exposed to lasers. The power used was only “6 joules”, whereas, the power used to remove hair is “50-60 joules” (this is a measurement of the power used. It is calculated by multiplying watts X time). Many of these patients will die of a brain tumor in 3 years. At present there is no way to know how many patients who were exposed to lasers have already died because they were not treated by doctors who know how to diagnose these cancers. “Technicians” who do this work in spas, electrolysis offices, and other places are not capeable of making this diagnosis and patients treated a few years ago never come back, therefore, there is no way to know how many hair removal patients died as a result of their TREATMENT.
Hair Removal Lasers have been around for about 10 years and a few thousand patients have tried it only to find their hair regrew. Most of the noise about lasers has been made by people who have a vested interst in selling them and by electrologists and skin care salons who also use these devices. It is illegal to use them unless you are a doctor. If you are a doctor’s employee and do this, the doctor MUST stand there and supervise the procedure (these are the words of FDA).
