While research shows some promise in certain areas like dermatology, it’s too soon to say it clearly provides health benefits more broadly—despite the many products being sold that seem to suggest otherwise.
Caution and Reservation should abound.
“To sell photobiomodulation now is to put the commercial cart in front of the evidence,” says Jonathan Jarry, a science communicator at McGill University’s Office for Science and Society.
Dr. Praveen Arany, an associate professor of oral biology who led the research and founded a biotechnology company to develop light-therapy devices, believes there is evidence to suggest the treatment can improve immune response.
In a clinic at Massachusetts General Hospital, patients with mood and cognitive disorders are also testing the treatment. Varying doses to the forehead have helped patients with depression find relief from the common side effects of antidepressants, says Dr. Paolo Cassano, an associate professor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School and director of the photobiomodulation clinic.
Red light is thought to work by penetrating the skin’s surface and boosting brain cells’ energy, oxygen, and blood flow to help them fire faster, he says.
These opinions are not scientifically proven, and largely based on anecdotal reports.
Dr. Praveen Arany, an associate professor of oral biology who led the research and founded a biotechnology company to develop light-therapy devices, believes there is evidence to suggest the treatment can improve immune response.
In a clinic at Massachusetts General Hospital, patients with mood and cognitive disorders are also testing the treatment. Varying doses to the forehead have helped patients with depression find relief from the common side effects of antidepressants, says Dr. Paolo Cassano, an associate professor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School and director of the photobiomodulation clinic.
Red light is thought to work by penetrating the skin’s surface and boosting brain cells’ energy, oxygen, and blood flow to help them fire faster, he says.
In Oslo, Christophe Brod, chief executive of beekeeping technology company Beefutures, who was inspired by some of Jeffery’s work, asked him to collaborate on research investigating whether red light could help bees be healthier and more productive in the face of growing stressors, from pesticides to climate change.
The red-light bees lived longer and recovered better from pesticide exposure and extreme weather. They also produced honey of a darker color, suggesting they may have flown further to different crops, says Brod, who is now developing a commercial red-light product that can be inserted into hives.
Tom O’Brien, who sustained a traumatic brain injury after a crane collapsed onto a parked car he was sitting in in 2016, started infrared and near-infrared light therapy with Cassano at Massachusetts General Hospital last year. O’Brien says that while other treatments didn’t seem to help, he started feeling happier and more energetic, and the pressure in his head eased, after trying photobiomodulation.
“The LED light therapy lit a fire of recovery in my brain and my body,” he says. “The spark that was me has returned.”
Psychiatrists recognize that most depressive episodes are self-limited and this could explain the results in one patient.
The evidence for red light therapy as beneficial is very weak if not absent.
It however will be a money-maker for entrepeneurs.
Snake oil salesmen are still active.
Red-light therapy is generally considered safe. Some photobiomodulation devices have been cleared by the Food and Drug Administration.
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