Laser Hair Removal VS. IPL
Overview
Hair removal treatment is developed to reduce undesirable hair growth. Normal treatment areas incorporate legs, armpits, face, feet and hand. Be that as it may, it's feasible to treat overgrown hair in almost any region, aside from the eyelid or encompassing region. Patients should choose the best method depending on their skin profile. For instance, skin with tattoos is not ideal for laser hair removal, but is perfectly fine with multi-wavelength IPL.
Meanwhile, hair tone and skin type impact the outcome of hair removal. Skin characteristics taken into consideration include the color of the hair as well as the color of the skin. For example, laser hair removal damages hair follicle while staying away from harm to the skin. On the contrary, IPL works on more skin tones but less effective on thicker skin because its light is unfocused.
In general, the potential of damage to skin is more prominent when there is little difference between hair and skin tone. However advanced medical laser technology have made laser hair removal a possibility for patients who have darker skin. Still, laser hair removal is less effective for hair colors that don't assimilate light well. In any case, more hair removal treatment methods are being developed as we speak.
How laser hair removal works?
Laser hair removal applies low-energy lasers on hair follicle to permanently reduce hair growth. Laser beams are a form of highly concentrated thermal energy, which are capable of targeting and destroying specific types of melanin, or pigment atoms, inside hair follicles under the skin.
Commonly used types of lasers for hair removal include ruby, alexandrite, and diode. These lasers yield the best results on light-skinned and dark-haired candidates. Then there are the Nd:YAG lasers (created by a kind of garnet crystal) that are capable of treating darker-toned skin on African-Americans.
Although lasers may permanently reduce hair growth, it would take more than one session to complete the treatment. This is because human's body hair cycles about six weeks as it grows. A total of three to eight sessions may be necessary to produce a permanent result of smooth and even skin. As a rule of thumb, laser hair removal works the best on light skin with dark hair. After a preoperative consultation with a dermatologist, the doctor would determine the characteristics of your body hair and select the most suitable laser for your treatment.
How IPL works?
Even though both lasers and intensive pulsed light (IPL) are widely used in cosmetic dermatology, many people cannot tell the difference. The first thing we should clarify is that IPL is not another type of laser. A laser beam is created by focusing light of one single wavelength. Whereas IPL is created with a broad-spectrum of light with more than one wavelengths, and thus is scattered and weaker.
IPL works because of a pigment molecule in hair called melanin: similar as a dark umbrella on a sunny trip, the melanin assists the hair with retaining the light from the sunlight, putting it into its dormant stage. This leaves you with smooth skin without hair.
The key difference between laser hair removal and IPL is their different depths of penetration beneath the skin. Generally speaking, lasers are ideal for hair removal because they can penetrate deeper down the skin to reach active hair follicles. In contrast, IPL technology is more effective for treating skin problems because it can target on the red blood cells found in superficial broken capillaries. Which means, IPL is less effective on thicker skin.