Page 144 - Chapter 3 - Laser/IPL Hair Removal

Chapter 3 – Fundamentals of Laser/IPL Hair Removal 2nd Edition
length of time, which is needed to reduce the total thermal damage to the tissues.
Unlike the previous two techniques, ice-packs can be kept on any region of the skin for several minutes prior to, and after, imparting the light energy.
Tests using a surface thermometer on the skin surface reveal that applying an ice-pack for 5 minutes rather than 1 minute has a significant effect on the cooling of the skin.
Figure 82 - The rise in skin surface temperature after pre-cooling for 1 and 5 minutes using ice packs
The above curves show clearly that applying pre-cooling for a longer period, results in more time taken for the skin to recover to normal temperature. This means that the dermis remains colder for longer – very useful for photothermal treatments.
Conclusion
Ice-cooling is, by far, the most efficient method of long-term cooling and, as a direct consequence, cools much more of the volume of the dermis compared with either air-cooling or the use of cryogens. Only ice-cooling maintains a constant cooling effect over time – the other two methods are usually applied in such a way that only the most superficial regions of the skin are properly cooled. (Tests with a cryogen system found that the ice-cooling packs were more “comfortable” than the cryogen – on ‘black’ skin!)
________________________________________________________________________ 144 Chapter 3, Ed. 2.0 Laser/IPL Hair Removal
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