Questions

I am about to have my first laser treatment in a couple of weeks. Can anyone tell me what the average amount of time is for bruising and swelling to go down? My PWS covers most of the left side of my face. One of the driving reasons for me doing this is to see if some of those bumps can go down. They just starting growing about 2 years ago.
Another question....what are the chances of treatments actually making the PWS worse looking? Has anyone ever heard of the treatments scarring or hastening the growth of PWS? Any info appreciated... 8)

[juliemn]

My son's treatment is done on most of the right side of his face. Everyone reacts a bit differently, but typical for him is a lot of swelling that starts several hours after treatment and lasts for the 2 days following treatment. The bruising/purpura usually develops by day 2 (day after treatment), and is fairly significant until about day 4 or 5. It usually takes about 2 weeks for the bruising to fade completely. These time frames are individual. You may react much differently. It depends on the settings of the laser also.

We have had no scarring or blistering. With the lasers used currently, there should not be problems like this. Of course, it depends on the knowledge of the user of the laser. As for making it worse, I've never heard of that happening. The laser is tuned to treat the vessels just under the skin..causing them to constrict/shrink, thus reducing the blood flow to the PWS.

HTH
Julie

[hankbartenbach]

Hi,

I completely agree with Julie. It really depends on the settings that the doctor uses and ever person does react differently to the treatment. I have always been treated pretty agressively so in my case the swelling lasts about a week. I drove myself to the treatments and back (when I was still driving of course).

What laser is the doctor using? I have used four different lasers and the most effective and is what Julie's son uses I think is the V-Beam Pulse Dye Laser. It is them most common used today.

If you have any question please let us know we are here for you.

Hank

Thanks for the replies. I appreciate the information. Hank--to answer your question Im not sure what beam they are using. I guess I havent done all my homework huh? The doctor I will be using is Freidman in Houston. I hear good things about him -- we will see. Ill holler back and let you know how it goes....Take care bud.