My Kind of Therapy

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome to All Things Men's Health, the podcast that dives
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Red light therapy something you've probably seen on Instagram. It's

(00:21):
definitely in all the spas, and the gem's gotten very
popular here lately. You get a lot a lot of
reports of just great success and how great it is.
But we're gonna take a little bit deeper look into
it and see if it lives up to all the hype.

(00:41):
We're going to break down the pros and cons and
some of the science behind this growing trend. For those
you know who aren't really familiar with red light therapy
or r l T, it uses low level red or
near infra red light to supposedly boost your skin, muscle,

(01:04):
and even some mental health. So it is. It's a
non invasive It typically involves just sitting or lying in
front of red light panels or using a handheld device.
It sounds like it's something that's maybe just been invented,
brand new, and that's why it's so popular, But the

(01:27):
truth is it's been around since say the nineteen sixties.
I think it kind of started out for medical purposes
like healing wounds, you know, scars, things like that. So

(01:48):
what's the prose, what's the good stuff of RLT and
why are people so obsessed with this therapy? Some of
the benefits skin health and anti aging. We're all looking
for that, right, at least everyone over twenty five. Red

(02:11):
light therapy is said to boost collagen production, which of
course very important to reduce wrinkles and fine lines and
even some scarring. There are several studies out there that
suggest it can even help with conditions like acne and roseatia,

(02:32):
and that's just that's just kind of the cosmetic side
of it. It can also reportedly help speed up muscle recovery.
It's used to reduce inflammation and alleviate chronic pain like arthritis.
You know, I know that a lot of athletes use

(02:52):
red light therapy because anytime you can speed up muscle recovery,
that means you can train more often and you can
train harder, and then of course, you know the pain
of arthritis and chronic pain. Anything you can do to
give a person a little bit of a quality of
life back, it's definitely worth it. So it's it's reported

(03:15):
to have some good effects on that also some mental
health benefits. There are some studies that say that it
can improve mood and in particular combat seasonal effective disorder,
and that's something that a lot of us suffer from.
I know whenever I go up north in the winter, Man,

(03:38):
it really hits me hard. You know, it's this is
a non invasive therapy. Uh, it's it's very simple. There's
no pain involved whatsoever. You know, you can have in
home devices, uh, you know, so you don't have to

(04:00):
go out to have this these procedures done or this
therapy done. You know, it can be even just like
a little handheld device or something almost looks like a
mirror that you're looking into. And again, you know, people

(04:20):
are you know, really having good results with this. I've
never used it myself. My wife uses it regularly. She
has amazing looking skin, so I can see some first
hand things of what she she uses. She just uses
a little handheld it almost looks like a curved razor

(04:45):
and it has different settings on it, you know that
you can do to supposedly control what kind of red
light or light your your skin is getting. But like
I said, she's definitely getting some good results from that.
You know, with any pros, there's also cons now, you know,

(05:10):
I just don't think there's a whole lot of major
cons to this or major negatives. There are a few.
I mean, it can be you know, it can be
expensive if you're going for professional treatments, depending on you know,
whether it's a doctor or some kind of tech technician.

(05:32):
You're looking at between fifty you know, maybe three hundred
and fifty dollars. Also depends on what kind of equipment
these people are using. So there's there's not It's not
cheap either way, the high quality panels costing hundreds to
thousands of dollars if you want that in your home.
And that's also one reason why professionals would charge a

(05:54):
little bit more for the type of equipment that they have.
You know, there is a little bit of a time
commitment to this, you know, to see any kind of results,
you know, ten to twenty minutes several times a week,
you know, for weeks or even months. I mean, it's
not a it's definitely not a one and done thing.
And ten to twenty minutes you know, a few times

(06:17):
a week probably itt't a big deal for most people,
but some people you know, just almost have to schedule that,
make an appointment with themselves or obviously make an appointment
with a professional get that done. So you can see
how the costs could could get pretty high if you're
actually going to see a professional to get this done.
I'm sure that you can buy different packages with so

(06:38):
many different appointments in it, so that probably be the
way to go there. There's still not a whole lot
of like evidence in their research for some of the claims,

(07:00):
particularly when it comes to uh, you know, treating depression
and some mental type situations. So so that's one there's
not there's not a whole lot of negative information on
what it does for your for your skin, because it
it does release the collagen with definitely it's going to

(07:22):
help your skin. You can use this too much, Using
it too often can cause skin irritation. If you use
it for too long, it could even cause some slight burns.
And like anything else, you know, it's not a magic
it's not like a magic wand you can wave and

(07:42):
suddenly your health is great, your skin is health is
healthy and looks great and and all that. It's just
it's not the way it works. Really, nothing works like that,
so you know, it is something you need to be
disciplined in and continue to do so you don't want
to be let yourself get disappointed if you don't see

(08:03):
results right away. So that's my initial take. That's what
we're gonna do for the next show is well, uh,
we're gonna ask some of my dermatologist friends for their
take on it, see what they say. Hopefully I can
get someone actually to be on this with me and

(08:26):
then you know, we'll take a look. And the next
one also to to finish up, is the red light
therapy really worth it? So that's something that we're going
to get into a little bit deeper, but right now
it is just kind of the basis the basics of
red light therapy r l T to to talk about

(08:48):
what it does, what what some of the possible positive
effects are, and also what you know, some of the
few negative consequences are effects are as well. So I
hope that this has has helped a little bit with
what's going on, you know, with with red light therapy,

(09:11):
and we can help help people make a little bit
more informed decision, you know, coming from someone who you
know has seen it, uh personally not used it. I
am going to start using it though, so but I
doubt I'll have those results in the next in the
next couple of weeks. Just uh, just remember with any

(09:33):
anything you know, make sure you do things as simple
as read the directions. Lots of times, you know, you
get what you pay for. So if you're going for
the the bottom basement type cheapest thing you can find,
you know your results may not be be as good
or as quick as if you, you know, do some
research cover something a little bit more expensive, but that

(09:55):
that may work a good bit better. So with that
being said, you know, I'm gonna I'm gonna leave it
at that, and when we uh, when we get back
on I'll have a little bit more information for you
on r l T and red light therapy. So I
hope everyone has a great day and we'll talk to

(10:16):
you uh soon