Evaluating the Efficiency of Low Level Laser Therapy (LLLT) in Combination With Intravenous Laser Therapy (IVL) on Diabetic Foot Ulcer, Added to Conventional Therapy

Abstract

Introduction: Low level laser therapy (LLLT) is gaining acceptance in clinical applications. For example, it is used as therapeutic modality in the repair of diabetic foot ulcer when conventional therapy was not effective, separately. The aim of this study is to determine the effect of local and intravenous LLLT for the healing of diabetic foot ulcer. Material & Methods: This study contains 74 diabetic foot-ulcers which were prone to resistance to conventional therapy. Different stages of diabetic foot are included in this study. The wounds irradiation are performed by the combination therapy of 650 nm and 860 nm laser, with the total energy density of 3.6 J/cm² plus intravenous laser therapy (IVL) with 2.5 MW, 650 nm laser used for 30 minutes. All wounds have been photographed from equal distance, before and after treatments, and all the wounds were staged by a surgeon who was disinterested and neutral about the effects of the laser therapy. Her judgments were based on the visual assessments of the wounds. All the mathematical and statistical analysis is based on the descriptive statistics which, is done by the SPSS 16 Results: in the result of this study; 62.2% (Forty-six out of the 74 ulcers) completely healed, 12.2% (Nine in numbers) healed more than 50%, 8.1% (Six in numbers) healed less than 50%, 5.4% (Four in numbers) not healed,12.2% (Nine in numbers) did not continue their treatment (less than 5 sessions of Laser therapy). Excluding, the wounds in stage 5, more than 80% of each stage’s wound, completely healed more than 50%, with in 2 months duration. In this study, we definitely can express that, all the Patients received some degrees of healing, during their laser receiving treatments. Conclusion: The combined local and intravenous LLLT promote the tissue repair process of diabetic foot ulcer. In this multi-disciplinary method, we achieved a remarkably shorter mean healing time of two months, compared with other reported studies with healing time of three to six months.