Effects of Low Level Laser Therapy on Orthodontic Tooth Movement: A Systematic Review

Abstract

The objective of this systematic review is to extract and study evidences available toassess the effectiveness of low level laser therapy (LLLT) on acceleration of Orthodontic tooth movement. The data sources used were electronic data bases including EMBASE, PubMed, Scopus and Google Scholar. References from collectedarticles were hand searched. Search was not bound with any time limits. Randomized control and clinical trials were also included. Search terms included were orthodontic movement speed/accelerated tooth movement/ LLLT/ Cold-soft diode laser/ Ga-Al-As laser/ low intensity laser/ light therapy/ phototherapy/ photobiostimulation. Only those studies which falls in the moderate to high category on assessment with Cericato et al. method for bias assessment were included. Double extractors did the data collection and at the time of controversies a blinded expert were approached for final decision. Nine studies seemed to be eligible for this study. An energy input of 4.2-8J sq.cm, wavelength of 780-904 nm applied for 80-100 sec/tooth within a time period of 4-6 days per month was found to be effective in demonstrating accelerated orthodontic tooth movement. Some scientific evidence for low level laser therapy causing accelerated orthodontic tooth movement was demonstrated. Those high evidence studies which came up with laser having no benefits on tooth movement explained their pit falls in the discussion, giving reason why they failed to observe any benefit in tooth movement.