Laser Surgery

History
The word "Laser" has long conjured up mental images of futuristic space age devices shooting a beam of light capable of doing everything from warming dinner to destroying planets. Laser is an acronym for "Light Amplification by Stimulated Emission of Radiation". Simply put, it aligns light of a given wavelength and amplifies it.

This sounds simple enough. Einstein envisioned laser in 1917 and Theodore Maiman invented it over 40 years later, but it was over two decades after that, in the mid eighties, that it found reasonable applications. The problems encountered were due to a couple of things. First, the type of laser light emitted varied widely according to wavelength, and what one type of laser was capable of was vastly different from another. Second the instruments were extremely bulky, expensive, and impractical.

Today
Since those days a lot of technological advances have been made. There are many types of lasers used in medicine, today, and each has its place. Medical lasers have been streamlined to less bulky, and less expensive machines. While the cost still precludes its use in most practices, many of us have determined that the improvement they make to medicine justifies the expense.

The most common type of laser used in veterinary medicine today is the CO2 laser. Laser surgery is less painful because it seals nerve endings as it moves through the tissue. There is much less bleeding because it seals smaller blood vessels as it "cuts". This makes some procedures faster since we don't spend as much time trying to control bleeding. Finally, there is much less swelling since it doesn't crush, tear or bruise (less trauma), and it seals lymphatics.

The risk of infection is lessened as the laser beam sterilizes as diseased tissues are removed. The precision is very great and the beam can "see" through tissue planes. Return to normal is hastened because there is less post-operative discomfort.

Procedures
Laser surgery is still in its infancy in veterinary medicine but it has already made a mark on the profession with a number of surgical uses.

Probably the most dramatic improvement we have seen is the recovery time on feline declaws. We have had a few cases that were operated and sent home within three hours of being admitted, showing no signs of pain or discomfort and no bleeding, no wraps, and no tourniquets. Routine neuters and spays also benefit from this modality.

Tumors, lumps and bumps are much easier to remove and healing is uneventful. Malignancies are better dealt with, as there is less risk of "seeding" the area with cancer cells, because they are destroyed with the laser beam.

The "snoring" problem seen with brachycephalic (short-nosed) dogs is another area easily amenable to the laser. Snoring and snorting are caused by an elongated soft palate in the roof of the mouth. This condition can lead to heart problems and shorten the life span of the animal. Before the laser, these dogs were seldom operated because it was a difficult, bloody and risky procedure. Now the surgery is a very short and easy procedure and these animals can go home the same day. If the nostrils are stenotic (closed), they can be operated at the same time.

There are many other conditions, too numerous to discuss on this page, that respond beautifully to laser surgery. If in doubt, ask if a given problem may benefit from laser
surgery. This is a relatively new and growing field of medicine.