Laser Treatment Gone Wrong? Female Lawyers Give Free Advice
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Every year we help hundreds of injured women make claims for compensation against hairdressers, beauty salons and laser clinics on a no win no fee basis.
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- Laser & IPL Treatment Injury Compensation Claims
- What Can I Do if I Was Injured by a Laser or IPL Treatment?
- If No Skin Patch Test Was Carried Out Can I Claim Compensation?
- If the IPL Laser Was Incorrectly Set Can I Claim Compensation?
- Who is Responsible for an Accident at a Laser Clinic?
- Laser Acne Treatment Burns
- Laser Scar Removal Injuries
- Solicitors That Deal With Laser & IPL Personal Injury Claims
- Case Study: IPL Laser Hair Removal Burns
Critics of the current system advocate the creation of an approved register of cosmetic laser treatment providers. The independent regulator of health and social care in England, the Care Quality Commission (CQC), legally requires cosmetic and laser clinics to register with it if they offer invasive cosmetic procedures such as nose surgery, laser lipolysis (including Smart Lipo) or refractive eye surgery. However, laser and IPL procedures including laser hair removal and laser skin resurfacing are not regulated by the CQC, and clinics offering these procedures therefore do not need to register with the body. Until the CQC extends its remit or a new register is introduced specifically for cosmetic laser treatment providers, numerous patients will continue to be injured every year due to poorly performed procedures, and sometimes their only option will be to seek legal advice.
The industry’s lack of regulation also means that laser clinics on occasion fail to observe basic safety standards leaving them responsible and legally liable for any resulting injuries. Basic safety measures include maintaining a hygienic premises and providing adequate ventilation, both of which minimise the chance of patients developing infections. When a laser treatment is being carried out on skin around the eyes, protective goggles must be provided to guard against the risk of ocular damage from beam exposure. There is also the possibility of a laser machine or device being poorly maintained, of inferior quality, or simply defective, in which case liability for an injury will lie with the either the clinic or the manufacturer of the equipment. Risks of this kind emphasise the importance for prospective patients of carefully researching a laser clinic’s facilities and track record prior to engaging its services.
Laser clinics are also responsible for thoroughly evaluating patients prior to carrying out laser procedures. Most importantly, a skin patch test should be carried out by directing the laser at a small area of skin to check for any adverse reaction and to determine the optimum settings (intensity and pulse duration) for a person’s skin and hair type. This should ideally be conducted 24-48 hours before a patient’s first laser treatment session. A medical consultation and evaluation is also essential to identify any contraindications such as pregnancy, diabetes, epilepsy, and a history of keloid (raised) scarring that make laser procedures unsuitable for certain people. In the vast majority of cases therefore, laser treatment accidents and injuries will be the responsibility of the laser clinic’s operatives and employees, for which the company’s owners will ultimately be held legally liable.
One of the most important responsibilities for practitioners offering laser acne treatments is to properly assess the suitability of a person’s skin for the procedure, and to check their medical condition via an extensive consultation. People with darker skin tones at most at risk of complications, as their skin will absorb more heat and light energy than those with lighter skin. This can lead to changes in the skin’s pigmentation, with darker skin sometimes becoming lighter in the targeted areas compared to surrounding skin. Those with darker skin tones are also more prone to hard keloid scars developing in treated areas, another unintended and avoidable side effect in some patients.
Pre-treatment evaluation of a patient should determine the wavelength and pulse duration of the laser light, a critical calculation given the damage that a laser set to the wrong frequency can cause. The laser must also be beamed onto the skin for exactly the right length of time to achieve the desired results. A skin patch test must be carried out, and the premises itself must be hygienic and properly ventilated to prevent infections. Certain contraindications make laser acne treatments unsuitable for individuals, including pregnancy, diabetes and various pre-existing medical conditions, and clinics and salons offering the procedure must identify these so as not to place a prospective client at risk of being injured.
In the case of acne scars, laser surgery serves an important additional function in destroying the bacteria and damaging the oil glands which cause acne. The undeniable benefits of laser scar removal often obscures the fact that laser procedures are highly technical in nature, especially the matching of laser type and beam intensity to individual scar characteristics. The skill of the dermatologist and laser technicians are essential to the success of the procedure, and the choice of clinic is therefore of paramount importance to the prospective patient.
Scarring is caused by an excess or lack of the supply of collagen to a wound during the healing process. Keloid scars are raised scars, resulting from concentrations collagen being formed, and may develop in size and surface area over time. Hypertrophic scars are similar, but will not expand beyond the site of the initial wound and will fade over time. Keloid and hypertrophic scars are generally treated with an intense non-ablative laser (the pulsed dye laser being the most popular) which does not burn off layers of skin, but rather targets underlying layers stimulating correction from the inside out. Acne and skin disease scars are defined as atrophic scars, characterised by small, regular depressions in the skin. These scars are best corrected using ablative lasers (most commonly CO2 and Erb:Yag lasers), that blast off the damaged layers of skin, and warm the dermis layer beneath producing fresh layers of healthy skin. The technology involved in laser scar removal is evolving all the time, and a doctor should be able to explain to a prospective patient the reasons for using a specific type of laser in their particular circumstances.
Though laser scar removal procedures have a high success rate, inevitably there are certain risks and side-effects involved. The laser itself may cause burns and additional scarring if it is beamed the wound site or surrounding areas of healthy skin for fractionally too long. Local anaesthetic is normally administered, and clinics must perform medical checks to ensure the patient does not suffer an adverse reaction. There are also a number of 'contra-indications' which make laser scar removal unsuitable, including skin diseases such as dermatitis and psoriasis. Those taking certain types of acne medication also face a higher risk of complications developing. There is a moderate risk of either hyperpigmentation (darkening of skin) or hypopigmentation (lightening of skin) resulting from laser scar removal treatments. Patients should be advised by clinics of the dangers posed by sun exposure in this context, which may worsen skin pigmentation changes.
Our firm went on to represent Ms S in a no win no fee claim against the laser clinic that carried out the procedure. We contacted the owners to inform them about the claim, and were subsequently put in contact with the clinic’s insurers. In support of Ms S’s claim we highlighted the fact that the laser machine’s intensity was higher during the treatment than it had been during the patch test, and that this quite clearly put our client at risk of being injured. We also provided a specialist medical report, along with before and after photographs of Ms S’s lower arms and legs, which clearly showed the burns and skin damage caused by the laser machine. The insurers were forced to acknowledge that an administrative error had resulted in the machine being incorrectly set up for Ms S’s treatment, and made a compensation offer that we deemed inadequate. Following further correspondence, the clinic accepted full liability and Ms S later received a cheque for £4,750 in compensation.
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