7 reasons, or Why lasers for PM removal break down?

Denis Tikhoruk, director of Medikalazer LLC

The presence of a laser device in a good beauty salon or clinic is becoming the norm for the Ukrainian market. More and more cosmetologists and PM removal specialists prefer to perform procedures with this modern and highly effective equipment. But, like any other technique, laser cosmetology devices require skillful and careful handling. Only with technically competent operation, the devices will serve for a long time and please with good results of the procedures.

Not all users of laser cosmetic devices comply with the technical requirements stated by the manufacturer, which leads to device breakdowns and premature wear. And no amount of education, thick instructions and other measures can fix this situation, and there are always some number of users who ignore the technical norms. In order to improve the technical literacy of users and minimize cases of device failure due to their own fault, we will describe the most common causes of device breakdowns that were provoked by consumers themselves. At the same time, we will arrange them in order of decreasing frequency and magnitude of negative consequences. We would like to hope that this material will save valuable equipment in beauty salons and ensure its long-term, commercially profitable operation.

Reason number 1. "Wrong" water

The use of water with characteristics different from those of distilled water in cooling systems is the most common mistake made by craftsmen.

Cooling systems of laser devices in many models use distilled water as a coolant. Distilled water is considered water, the characteristics of which correspond to GOST 6709-72 “Distilled water” adopted back in 1974. The standard stipulates that one of the important characteristics of distilled water is a small amount of crystalline residue after evaporation. Its mass concentration should be no more than 5 mg / dm3. With such a low mass concentration in the channels of the cooling system, there is no significant precipitation of crystalline deposits that clog the cooling system. Inlet water with other characteristics leads to sedimentation and clogging of cooling systems. Diode lasers with microchannel cooling of the diode assembly are especially sensitive to water quality.

Photo 1 . Sediment deposits in the water tank of the laser machine

In addition, some owners of the devices add any chemicals to the water that are not provided by the manufacturers at all. For example, one of the users of the device added chlorhexidine. He sincerely believed that such an additive would prevent the reproduction of microflora. At the same time, he did not take into account that the chlorhexidine solution can interact with the metal parts of the apparatus and have a negative effect on them.

Reason number 2. Overheating of devices due to blockages in the cooling system

Clogging of cooling systems leads to gradual overheating of the elements for generating laser or light radiation, changes in their operating parameters and, ultimately, failure. In addition, until the moment of complete failure, incorrect operation of the generating elements can lead to a gradual failure of radio-electronic elements on the control boards of the device - for example, field-effect transistors. Overheating of laser radiation generation elements can lead to the destruction of yttrium-aluminum garnet rods in neodymium lasers or burnout of diodes in diode laser assemblies.

Photo 2. Deposition of crystalline sediment from poor-quality water on the lamp, which led to the gradual failure of the lamp

Reason number 3. Incorrect preservation of devices

Incorrect preservation of devices without draining liquids. Some of the owners of the devices do not use the devices for some period of time (from two months or more) either because of repairs in the premises, or for other reasons. At the same time, the owners ignore the procedure for preserving the device - they do not drain the coolant (water) and do not place the device in a package to protect it from dusting.

Photo 3. Bacterial blockages in the nozzles of the device, which was mothballed with a violation: water was not drained

This does not take into account the technical feature of the cooling systems of the apparatus that they are leaky. Dust and bacteria penetrate through the technical openings into the water, albeit in very small quantities. And over time, microflora can begin to multiply in the cooling tanks and water channels, which further leads to clogging of the cooling system.

Reason number 4. The operation of devices and their parts in unforeseen modes

This category of cases includes:

• use of emergency shutdown buttons for daily de-energization of the device with further breakdown of the buttons;
• directing the laser beam onto the control display screen with subsequent damage to the display;
• twisting together several nozzles for the maniple - with a deterioration in the results of procedures and burnout of the nozzles - and many other violations that occur due to poor assimilation of the material by the users of the devices during training.

Photo 4. Nozzle burn-out (dark spot on glass) due to contaminant entering the surface and untimely cleaning

Violations of operating modes do not always lead to a complete failure of the device, if they can be quickly detected and stopped. Everything can be limited only to a temporary deterioration in the quality of procedures. For example, there was a case when the user of the device tried to perform a carbon peeling procedure by twisting together several nozzles and positioning the handpiece so that there was a distance of up to 25 cm from the nozzle to the patient's skin. In this case, the device did not break down, but the user complained about the inefficiency of the procedures.

To be continued…