Confused over red light vs blue light
I hope someone can shed some light - no pun intended - on the red light
therapy vs combo red and blue light therapy. I was told that red light
is good for Rosacea and blue light for acne like lesions so why not do
the combo instead of just the red light? Anyone have any thoughts on
this.
-I've read that pure red light is best for rosacea... don't know the science
behind it, but consider that the sort rosaceans get has an entirely different
set of mechanics behind it than the vulgaris/common variety.
It is well known that rosacea acne gets worse from most (if not all) of the
treatments that work on the standard kind. So you're not really dealing with
the same animal, despite appearances.
I don't know who first discovered that taking away the blue light is better
for rosacea, but there's bound to be a write up somewhere on the WWW.
Consider too that UV light (blue wavelength) is good for regular acne...
but bad stuff for the rosacea kind.
-We already have a page in the RSRP for "Red LED Lamps" under the
"Other Anti-Inflammatory Therapies" section. Here's the direct link:
http://rosacea-research.org/wiki/index.php/Red_LED_Lamps
I just updated it to include the links to some "Rosacea News" articles
on the subject since they are excellent.
To answer the original question though, while I'm no expert, the red
light wave lengths seem to provide an anti-inflammatory effect which
seems to be helpful in treating rosacea. The blue light wave length
seems to provide more of an antibacterial effect (against p. acnes),
useful in treating traditionial acne, but it may be too harsh for
rosacea skin and irritate it further.