26/06/2024
⚠️ This blanketed recommendation has been pervasive in the red light therapy space ever since I entered 6+ years ago & it has NEVER made sense to me ⚠️
What is this 20 – 30 minute duration based upon? Certainly, it is not something I ever see recommended in the photobiomodulation research.
At the end of the day, an effective RLT treatment is based upon the recommended dosge, which is predicated on: a.) what you are trying to treat and b.) the light irradiance of your device.
As you can imagine, if your goal is anti-aging skin treatments, those RLT sessions will be much shorter than if you are trying to treat anxiety/stress via the frontal lobe of your brain; and those RLT brain sessions will be considerably longer than if you are treating your thyroid or for muscle pain and so on.
And the duration of a given treatment will also be a moving target depending on the device you are utilizing. As an extreme example, to reach the same desired dosage, a duration with a red light bulb will be exponentially longer than with a red laser.
So the duration of a treatment is actually quite nuanced based on what you are trying to treat and what device you have.
Lastly, when we consider the biphasic dose response, we know that “more is not better.” That is true for both RLT on a given day but also in a given week. Using RLT every single day will not lead to better results that doing, say, 3 – 4 days/week. Your cells need time to recover and respond to RLT, as it is a hormetic response, similar to exercising.
So whenever you see someone providing their recommendations for RLT durations, you should be asking them some questions: What is that duration based on? What are you trying to treat? What is the light irradiance of the device you are using? Is your device third party tested (if not, the light irradiance measurement is likely grossly over-inflated)?
Knowledge is power.