I wanted to share one of my favorite tools that I have in my office with you: low-level laser therapy, also known as cold laser. Today I want to talk specifically in the context of post-surgical pain.
Surgery should be, generally speaking, our last option. But sometimes it's necessary, and no one goes into surgery as a patient or a doctor or surgeon expecting poor outcomes or side effects. Still, occasionally they happen—maybe there's nerve damage or some degree of post-surgical pain demanding treatment. And often, conventionally speaking, all that's available are things like painkillers.
That's not a viable long-term option for a lot of people. And furthermore, for things like nerve pain: nerves regenerate and heal very slowly. So it can be a lingering and harrowing situation for a lot of folks. This is where I turn to low-level laser therapy.
What can it do?
Laser therapy is unique in that it serves two mechanisms. One, it can help reduce pain—it reduces pain nerve fibers from firing, which decreases the level of pain. The other part is that it can actually speed up healing. It does that through stimulating and activating our mitochondria—the little power plants of all of our cells.
Mitochondria are responsible for making energy and helping to heal and repair our tissue. Low-level laser therapy has been shown in a lot of research to up-regulate the production of energy at the level of the mitochondria, so it helps us heal faster. This is incredibly valuable in post-surgical pain and specifically nerve pain, because nerves heal very slowly.
In a typical session, low-level laser therapy can drop pain levels, making living much more tolerable. But secondly, it can speed up the healing of the problem. This allows us to be on medication as little as possible, for a short period, and lead a more comfortable existence while we're working on healing.
That's low-level laser therapy for post-surgical pain and nerve pain—one of my favorite tools. If you're suffering, give us a call; every new patient starts with a free 15-minute intro call.
This article is for general education and isn't a substitute for individual medical advice. For a medical emergency, call 911 or go to the nearest emergency room.