Laser Test Patches

Special Issues Transgender / Transsexual
#1

Hi everyone, I’m new and I’m MTF.

Before anyone tries to tell me not to get laser, I understand the success rate and I’m using it to get initial clearance to make electro easier and to decrease my beard shadow thingie.

I had a test patch done at 17 joules last week and the skin was red for about half an hour. The laser nurse said she did it low just to see that my skin wouldn’t burn, and told me after a week I can see if the hair responds. It’s been a week, and other people tell me I should wait two weeks. So far, the hair follicles look just as they did before the test patch.

She said she would eventually go up to 27 joules on me, and I’m wondering if anyone here knows if i just need to wait it out 2 weeks, or if it just has to do with the low joules that she used, or maybe does this indicate that my hair wont respond to laser? I’m a type III on the Fitzpatrick scale with light olive skin and dark, coarse hair.

Any ideas? Any help is appreciated. I’ve scheduled an appointment for next week so I can start while I’m on break from school, but I can cancel the appointment if I find out important contrary information.

Thanks!

#2

If you don’t have a local electrologist who can clear you to first clearance in 10 to 20 hours, spread out over a few days, or a few weeks as you may have time for, then I guess that is a route that has some merit.

#3

Hi, I’m new to this forum also but I have extensive laser and electrolysis experience and have treated many MTF clients in metro Detroit over the past 27 years. We also have a support group for TG ladies meeting at our office on 2nd Sunday of month. Results with laser are definitely faster and gives you a jump start on clearance when starting out and electrolysis does makes sense when there is less hair growth or if the hair is too light to treat with laser. Starting with laser gives you the benefit of speed and hair growth reduction especially since you have dense dark hair. The treatments are definitely effective since dark hair has a lot of melanin. Do you know what laser is being used on you? Any logic to having a spot test done at 17 if the laser nurse intends to use 27jules for he actual treatment? When you are having your very first laser treatment, its a good idea to be more conservative with the setting because you have a lot of density and a lot of hair in the skin is not in the anagen stage. So when all hair sheds and you clear the slate, you can easily less trauma to the skin. It usually takes 10days to 2 weeks for the hair to purge from the skin if an alexandrite or diode laser is used 755 -800nm. If an NdYag 1064nm. is used, it will take longer for the shedding process possibly up to 3weeks post treatment. The redness for several hours and the feeling that you have a mild sunburn for appx.2hours post treatment is normal.

#4

Yeah, the laser is a LightSheer Diode.

The nurse said she did a test patch at 17 joules to see if it would burn me bad, but it didn’t. And she said she wouldn’t start at 27 joules right away, she said she’d start at 17 I think but could go as high as 27.