questions about laser treatments for a 5 year old

[smurph]

Hi there!
My 5 year old daughter will probably be having laser treatment done soon on the remainder of her hemangioma (under her nose and above her lip line). We have a consultation appt. on Feb. 8th and I was wondering what kinds of questions would be good to ask.

Anyone here with experience with this for a child this age? Did your child have anesthesia or did they just use the numbing cream? How painful was it...during and after?

Thanks!
Shannon

[nickbar]

Hi Shannon,

Is this her first laser tx?. Here are some questions..

1. either ask the doctor or research how much experience this doctor has with tx. hemangiomas with laser.
2. Is the doctor going to do the entire area,
3. how long will the procedure take,
4. what does the doc prefer anesthesia or not, why? should be based specifc to your daughter's case.
5. Will numbing cream decrease the effectiveness of the tx. (scatter the light more). Would a local injection of anesthesia be an option?
6. What type of laser and what settings are recommended?
7. How many procedures will it take to get desired result? Will the first procedure be conservative to see how the tissue reacts?
8. What will I expect post laser? What should I be concern with, look for? What do I do if it starts to ulcerate or bleed, looks infected? How often should I put on ointment? Pain meds? Avoid anything?
9. How long until we see results?

This is a start.

[jennacl]

My daughter (4mo. with H on left cheek) began her laser treatment last week and I asked the questions above. Most importantly find out about the equipment being used (ie. pulse dye laser vs. old school lasers). There has been many articles written on the effectiveness of laser treatments on hemangiomas (most say it's not worth it) but those were referring to the older laser equipment and not to the pulse dye (which is what we had). Our doctor is very experienced in using the equipment so we were comforted in beginning this part of the treatment plan. Also I'm not sure if this is a factor in your questions but we were told while we were paying for the treatment that had our daughter been older in age or had it in the hospital OR then we would have paid more since they would administer anesthesia. They said that in an older child, the laser treatment would be too traumatizing if they were alert for the entire thing. You may want to ask about the policy if there is any for that as well.

As for laser experience/post-laser care: my daughter has responded well. She did not have any anesthesia or numbing cream and cried for just a little bit until i fed her a bottle to sooth her (she was in the middle of feeding when it happened --bad timing on my part). I will say the post-laser is not pretty as the area will be purple/gray and blistering will happen. We were told the area would not hurt to the touch as the pulse laser is hitting underneath the skin but we opted not to touch it, especially when the blisters were present. Also we were told there was nothing to do for the area expect to let it run its course of healing on its own. We were mindful to the area during bathtime (not getting it wet due to the blisters). After a few days the blisters went down and began scabbing. It's been almost a week and we're pleased with the results so far. It's faded quite a bit and we think she'll need atleast 3-4 more laser treatments till it's completely gone.

I hope this helps!