lightrelief.com

Ducky

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Any truth to the claim that red LED lights can manage pain?

Sounds like it's on the same level as the inset fuel stabalizer and the magnet therapy jusnk...


www.lightrelief.com

It astonishes me the crap that gets sold at 3am on cable tv...
 
fowlsound said:
Any truth to the claim that red LED lights can manage pain?
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Not accouding to pubmed.
 
Oh, we had a thread on this before. I seem to remember arguing with some woo who declared that phototherapy has legitimate medical uses (specifically, the treatment of jaundiced infants), therefore it shouldn't be dismissed as woo.

It is in fact total and complete woo.

Rolfe.

Edited to add: It was this thread. This one is relevant too. I note that Steve Grenard was the one arguing for the woo viewpoint on both occasions.
 
Rolfe said:
Oh, we had a thread on this before. I seem to remember arguing with some woo who declared that phototherapy has legitimate medical uses (specifically, the treatment of jaundiced infants), therefore it shouldn't be dismissed as woo.

It is in fact total and complete woo.

Rolfe.

Edited to add: It was this thread. This one is relevant too. I note that Steve Grenard was the one arguing for the woo viewpoint on both occasions.
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Thanks! I shall read up now...;)
 
well, I don't know about its uses for pain relief (although since the applicator does heat up and heat does relief certian types of pain that could be argued it does help some pain - no more than a heating pad perhaps) but I do know that Doctors are now charging thousands of dollars for facial treat,ments with LED therapy - if light therapy is woo - the docs are making big bucks off of it.
http://www.topdocs.com/display_procedure.php?id=led
 
Barbrae said:
well, I don't know about its uses for pain relief (although since the applicator does heat up and heat does relief certian types of pain that could be argued it does help some pain - no more than a heating pad perhaps) but I do know that Doctors are now charging thousands of dollars for facial treat,ments with LED therapy - if light therapy is woo - the docs are making big bucks off of it.
http://www.topdocs.com/display_procedure.php?id=led
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This does look like it needs to reside in the Woo room of the Big Brother credibility house.
I know next to nothing about LED therapy, but from a medical perspective I seriously doubt the claims.
I would also point out that what seems to be proposed here is quite different from Photodynamic therapy, which is well validated.
In this, photosensitisers are given to the patient which is taken up into the area of abnormality you wish to tackle (pesoriasis, skin cancers/lesions), then red laser light shone on the lesion.
I suspect many might confuse the two.
Woos typical work on the pseudo/semi-scientific fringes though - take something that people may be familiar with that does work, tinker around a bit and hey presto - a new treatment emerges that can be "sold" on the back of the one that does work but which has no evidence base, no predictability in effect and no repeatability - failing all counts of scientific methodology.
 
Barbrae said:
well, I don't know about its uses for pain relief (although since the applicator does heat up and heat does relief certian types of pain that could be argued it does help some pain - no more than a heating pad perhaps) but I do know that Doctors are now charging thousands of dollars for facial treat,ments with LED therapy - if light therapy is woo - the docs are making big bucks off of it.
http://www.topdocs.com/display_procedure.php?id=led
Click to expand...
*whacks woo 'doctors' with an ethics inquiry.*
 
BronzeDog said:
*whacks woo 'doctors' with an ethics inquiry.*
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Agreed! What's the odds those pictures are "doctored?"

Bad pun, but still...:D
 
BronzeDog said:
*whacks woo 'doctors' with an ethics inquiry.*
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it's not "woo" doctors, LED light facial therapy is common practice among plastic surgeons and dermatologists. Many of these offices offer this treatment.
 
Barbrae said:
it's not "woo" doctors, LED light facial therapy is common practice among plastic surgeons and dermatologists. Many of these offices offer this treatment.
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Even if they're primarily evidence-based medicine, using an unproven treatment like that is too much woo-dipping for my tastes. I have a very low tolerance for such things unless they're doing properly controlled studies.
 
The difficulty is that there are some areas where light is genuinely therapeutic. Treating neonatal jaundice for one. Light therapy for SAD is another. And I believe there are some very high-tech applications where certain photosensitive substances are administered topically or by mouth or injection, then activated (in the skin I think) by shining a particular light on the area in question.

One therefore has to evaluate each particular example to see how legitimate it is. I see that the site Barb linked to does mention what I think is a legitimate aplication.
One of the original applications for LEDs was PhotoDynamic Therapy (PDT), using photo-activated creams (Levulan®) for the treatment of actinic keratosis and pre-cancerous lesions.
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But when you read on about what these guys are actually offering, in my opnion it's woo and these pictures are in some way "rose-coloured". Subject to fuller and better evidence of course.

I'm also very suspicious by about the way the whole site is hedged around with copyright notices. When I tried to copy that sentence to quote here, I got a copyright violation pop-up! Never encountered that before, anywhere. And if they have any double-blind, properly scientific publications on the method, they're not exactly going out of their way to draw attention to them.

Sadly, having a medical degree is no guarantee that someone won't succumb to the quick and easy buck of quackery.

Rolfe.
 
Rolfe said:
Sadly, having a medical degree is no guarantee that someone won't succumb to the quick and easy buck of quackery.

Rolfe.
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[Yoda] ...The quick and easy path... That way leads to the Dark Side. [/Yoda]
 
Rolfe said:

Sadly, having a medical degree is no guarantee that someone won't succumb to the quick and easy buck of quackery.

Rolfe. [/QUOTE

but it's not justr "someone" but rather most doctors in the specialty of dermatology or plastic surgery centers. This treatment is standard - not just offered by a few "woo" folks.
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Barbrae said:
Rolfe said:

Sadly, having a medical degree is no guarantee that someone won't succumb to the quick and easy buck of quackery.

Rolfe. [/QUOTE

but it's not justr "someone" but rather most doctors in the specialty of dermatology or plastic surgery centers. This treatment is standard - not just offered by a few "woo" folks.
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I was under the impression that was a laser procedure, not a bunch of LEDs...

Am I off in that opinion?
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fowlsound said:
I was under the impression that was a laser procedure, not a bunch of LEDs...

Am I off in that opinion?
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both are available. laser has downtime and can be painful but no negative effects from led.
 
Barbrae, do you have anything other than an appeal to authority and an appeal to popularity, rolled into one?
 
When I worked at a local hospital, we had to repair special fluorescent fixtures used in the neonatal unit to treat hyperbilirubinemia in some infants (don't expect me to know exactly what this is). These were special lamps emitting mostly in the blue to UV region, and they weren't woo. Toward the other end of the spectrum, infrared lamps provide superficial warmth that can be theraputic. Further on, photon wavelengths near the centimeter region and longer can provide deep heating (see also: diathermy). Some other positive effects, such as vitamin D production, are produced by exposure to various photon wavebands.

Bottom line: while theraputic benefits can be expected for some conditions by exposure to photonic energy, I'd bet that if it's sold as a cure-all, it's almost certainly bogus.

Dave
 
Donks said:
Barbrae, do you have anything other than an appeal to authority and an appeal to popularity, rolled into one?
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I Think at this point someone else's word is best for the situation:

"This new learning amazes me, Sir Gallahad. Explain to me again how Sheep's bladders can be employed to prevent earthquake..."


:D
 
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