What are the benefits of Red Light Therapy?

Red Light Therapy for Pain Relief

• Herniated and bulging discs
• Muscle related back pain
• Osteoarthritis 
• Fibromyalgia
• Pulled and strained muscles, Muscles spasms 
• Inflammation
• Nerve injuries
• Sports injuries
• Neck Pain and stiffness

How do I calculate the dosage time based on distance to the light?

Standarized units are of J/cm^2 (Joules per centimeter squared). If you are seeking a particular dose based on distance from the panel and time, lookup the Irradiance provided on the product page, and follow the formula below.

Target Dose (J/cm^2) * 1000 / Irradiance (mW/cm^2) / 60 (sec/min) = Time (min)

Here is a handy chart to help select some standard doses and distances.

At about 6″ from the device, you will receive approximatively 60 Joules of therapeutic energy within 10 minutes, which is optimal for overall health benefits, including deep tissue treatment. However, if you are only interested in skin-related improvements, just 5 minutes at a distance of 12″ from the device is sufficient based on published clinical studies.

Consistency is key when it comes to light therapy. Therefore, for best results, we recommend daily treatments. Or at the very least, 5 times per week. For some health challenges, additional benefits are possible with two treatments per day.

How soon can I expect results?

The amount of time required see improvements depends on each person’s individual health challenges. Because the cellular health benefits have been thoroughly proven across hundreds of clinical studies, it’s important to understand that your body is benefiting from the therapy. There are many factors that affect how quickly you may experience improvements in your symptoms. Some people will see benefits like reduced inflammation, pain relief, and wound healing within a matter of days.

But, overall improvements in health or skin-related benefits can take 8-12 weeks of consistent use to see results. By using your Light on a daily basis, you can maximize the rate of healing within your body.

Are there any side effects?

Dr. Michael Hamblin has participated in over 3000 published studies in the field of photobiomodulation. His work, as well as many others in the field, have documented virtually no side effects when using red and infrared light therapy within the optional range of wavelengths. 

Supplementing with Red and Infrared

It’s been proven that red light therapy can:

Reserve photoaging

Reduce Wrinkles 

Increase Collagen Synthesis

Increase healing and recovery

Decreasing inflammation

In research, there are 2 clear details that determine how effective red-light therapy will be. First is the wavelength of the light. There are two wavelengths of the red light that show the most benefit, wavelengths of red light that show the most benefit. 630 – 670nm? And 820 – 870nm?

Second, the intensity of the light matters. Lower intensity light will have less effect and take a much longer time to benefit. Higher intensity light will penetrate the body deeper and take less time to be effective.

Red light works on the skin by stimulating cytochrome c oxidase in the cells. Infrared light is said to penetrate the skin up to 1.5 inches and works on cells deeper that what red light can penetrate. However, studies show that both red and infrared appear to do similar things in the body and thus infrared does what red light does, but passes deeper into the body. So infrared can work on joints, bone, cartilage, and musculoskeletal problems. Near-infrared also shows benefits for athletic performance and recovery, diabetes, kidney disease and eye health!

Researchers  in Israel have proven that red and infrared on the tibia or sternum can increase stem cells release from bone marrow!

Stand about About 6-12″ away. The closer you are, the more Joules of energy you’ll receive. Here are our general treatment guidelines if you’re interested.

For proactive health, I’d recommend 8-10 minutes per treatment area. For “problem areas”, you can probably go a little longer (10-12 minutes).

It’s completely safe to look at the light. In fact, the specific wavelengths you’re using have been clinically proven to be beneficial when it comes to vision. Here’s just one of many published studies.

Wavelengths in the 600-700 nm range are chosen for treating superficial tissue, and wavelengths between 780 and 950 nm are chosen for deeper-seated tissues, due to longer optical penetration distances through tissue.

The bulk of clinical literature suggests that light mid-600 nm range and low-to-mid 800nm range is extremely effective.

That is because these wavelengths have the greatest effect on the cellular respiration process.

The most beneficial of these peaks are in the range of 660-670 nm and 830-850 nm. These wavelengths have been proven to produce substantial improvements in cellular function with a wide range of resulting benefits including improved skin health, enhanced muscle recovery, reduced joint pain, increased testosterone, and even weight loss!

Intensity matters when specific wavelengths are researched for specific effects, which is demonstrated in this study. Wavelengths of 660 and 810 nm with with the fluency 8 J/cm² demonstrated the potential to reduce cognitive impairments associated with aging and mitochondrial dysfunction. But when the fluency was at 4J/cm2 the light had minimal effect. 8 J/cm² is a lot of energy. Just changing the wavelength slightly or the combination of wavelengths would change the results. 

While intensity matters, it’s not everything. Too high is bad. Too low will not yield a benefit.

This is called a biphasic response. Too much light causes the opposite of what we’re trying to achieve. Too little light has no effect.

So higher intensity is not better. LLLT has a dual response curve. Meaning if the intensity and light delivered is too high, a negative effect will occur. If it’s too low, no effect will occur.

Figure from https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2790317/

There’s a Goldilocks zone of the right dose. Unfortunately, this zone is not well studied yet. We know what this zone and response curve is for specific wavelengths that have been studied, but not for all wavelengths and not for combinations of wavelengths. And again, this is studied using specific parameters, usually Cytochrome C Oxidase activation. Who’s to say there could be more things that happen in the body, some of them taking weeks or months to fully show up. This has not been studied.

Again, intensity matters. We want just the right amount of intensity without going over or under

How soon can I expect results?

The amount of time required to see improvements depends on each person’s individual health challenges. Because the cellular health benefits have been thoroughly proven across hundreds of clinical studies, it’s important to understand that your body is benefiting from the therapy. There are many factors that affect how quickly you may experience improvements in your symptoms. Some people will see benefits like reduced inflammation, pain relief, and wound healing within a matter of days. But, overall improvements in health or skin-related benefits can take 8-12 weeks of consistent use to see results. By using your Light on a daily basis, you can maximize the rate of healing within your body.