Using Cold Laser Therapy for Pain Management

Managing pain is a tricky task. While pain medication can work at first, the body can get used to a certain amount, causing you to have to take more. Whether you take opioids or other painkillers, they come with side effects and the potential for addiction. But what other options do you have for dealing with acute or chronic pain?

A solution you may not be aware of is called cold laser therapy. Keep reading to learn more about this treatment and how it can help you manage pain and recover from injuries.

What Is Cold Laser Therapy?

Unlike the lasers you see in science fiction and painkillers, which only mask the pain, cold laser therapy is a treatment that was created to help the body jumpstart its own natural process to heal itself. Compared to other solutions to pain, this cold laser actually addresses the source of pain.

How Cold Laser Therapy Works

Chances are when you think of a laser, you think of those that are used to cut or remove through objects or tissue. These thermal lasers are often used in medical and dental procedures to be as precise as possible in making incisions.

However, cold laser therapy uses a lower wavelength that doesn’t heat or damage the skin at all, but it reaches into the injured tissue. When the photons interact with the cells, they activate the cells, encouraging them to accelerate the healing process and regenerate. You can think of it as photosynthesis for plants! As part of this healing process, inflammation and pain are drastically reduced.

The laser is focused directly over the injury for roughly 30 seconds to a couple of minutes, depending on the extent of the injury, and the wavelengths can penetrate up to 5 centimeters below the skin.

Why You Should Consider Cold Laser Therapy for Pain Management

If you are in pain, whether acute or chronic, you probably feel like you’d give anything to relieve it. Cold laser therapy is a non-invasive solution to pain management because it comes with basically no side effects. The entire treatment only takes a handful of minutes at most, and it isn’t painful. Although relief may not necessarily be instantaneous, it can help your body heal more quickly and lead to faster pain relief.

If you are tired of having to deal with pain, you should discuss cold laser therapy with your pain management team. They may take advantage of this technology and offer a way you can overcome pain in a better way and finally get relief from your injury.

About the Practice

Richardson Pain & Wellness explores many different ways to address conservative pain management. In addition to cold laser therapy, we can also provide physical therapy and joint injections. In some cases, we are even able to prevent the need for more invasive surgeries. To learn more about cold laser therapy, or see if you are a good candidate for this treatment, contact our Richardson team by calling 972-907-1125 or visiting our Contact Us page.