Type of Surgery
Information
Last updated: 04/27/2009
The risk of death from laser hair removal is essentially zero. There are some possible negative outcomes from the procedure, however. Patients may experience blistering, darkening or lightening of the treated skin, scabs, burns, or scarring. In patients that are prone to it, mostly African Americans, keloids may occur. Keloids are areas of raised scar tissue on the skin.
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Epilation by laser was performed experimentally for about 20 years before it became commercially available in the mid 1990s. Intense Pulsed Light (IPL) epilators, though technically not a laser, use xenon flash lamps that emit full spectrum light. Laser and light-based methods, sometimes called phototricholysis or photoepilation, are now most commonly referred to collectively as "laser hair removal". One of the first published articles describing laser hair removal was authored by the group at Massachusetts General Hospital in 1998.
The efficacy of laser hair removal is now generally accepted in the dermatology community, and laser hair removal is widely practiced. Many reviews of laser hair removal methods, safety, and efficacy have been published in the dermatology literature.
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