What is Phototherapy?

What is Phototherapy?

Are you confused about Light Therapy and all the different names associated with it? You are not alone. From what I hear, most people want to know about the benefits of light and are totally confused about the differences between Saunas, Lasers, Light bulbs, SAD boxes and everything else! Let me try to clarify what some of the acronyms mean.

• LLLT =  Low Level Light Therapy- commonly known as LED Light Therapy either hand held devices or pad based systems are all part of LLLT.
• LED =  Light Emitting Diode- a special bulb created for lighting solutions (these you do not want for your home or in your life. They have deleterious effects on your health and vision) and also created for pad based and hand held health promoting systems.
• SLED =  Superluminous Light Emitting Diode (combines the benefit laser-like effect with the durability of LED), this is what you want in any health promoting device.
• PLT =  Polychromatic Light Therapy, more than one color of light
• PPLLT  =  Progressive Pulsed Low Level Light Therapy- the frequencies of light progress from one hertz to another every 2-3 minutes. This is ideal when encouraging the body to change. What we don’t want is adaptation on a cellular level.
• PBM  =  Photobiomodulation- photo= light, bio= biology, modulation= to stimulate or inhibit. This is what we are doing on a cellular level when using light for health benefits.
• PBMT =  Photobiomodulation Therapy (the most recent definition adopted by the North American Light Association (NALT) & World Association of Light Therapy (WALT).

So now you can see that there are many acronyms used when describing the same thing.  Lasers are not LED Light; most Saunas are FIR (far-infrared) and use the benefits of NIR to discuss their technology. The reality is however, that real benefits are from near-infrared.

Brief History of Light

The healing effects of Light began with the sun and has been a continuous area of study for thousands of years.  Some of this history includes Ancient Egypt where they practiced Ka Ba Sum therapy. Basically, this is channeling light, similar to Reiki and was thought to be working with layers in the body, with each layer having a specific purpose. We could think of this as comparable to Dr. Nogier’s discovery of the inherent frequency layers of the body.

So, what does this have to do with modern times?  We can look to our ancestors in this lineage of light and say thank you. Without this unbroken lineage, we probably would not have the modern medical miracles with light that we are currently witnessing.

Why combine phototherapy with acupuncture points?

It simply makes it work better. We now know that we are designed to receive light in two ways: via the eyes and via the acupuncture points.  It’s been proven that when light is applied to the body, it is absorbed via acu-points and then it travels along the meridians.  Amazing, right? I was quite surprised to discover this fact.  What does this mean? It means that we have a very easy to use modality whereby we can eliminate pain, support organ function, allow the body to release negative emotions & balance hormones as well as connect to Spirit.  It sounds too good to be true but this is exactly what happened to me when I began using PBMT/Light therapy on myself.

Take a look at this study that was done in North Korea at PyongYang University (shocking but true!)

Professor Kim Bong Han:  1960-Studied the acu-points of animals, he injected radioactive dye into an acu-point and followed the uptake of the substance into surrounding tissue with micro autoradiography techniques he discovered that the radioactive dye follows the path of classic acupuncture meridians. 

Evidence-Based Complementary and Alternative Medicine Volume 2015, Article ID 361974, 17 pages

http://dx.doi.org/10.1155/2015/361974

Whether you are using a pad based system such as the inLight Therapy LED system, or Phototherapy Patches such as LifeWave’s, placing Light directly on the body, especially when placed on strategic acupuncture points, will benefit your health, boost your immune system, offset S.A.D and much, much more.