Lasers in medicine

Since their invention in 1960, lasers have appeared as potentially interesting light sources for medicine, as they possess three characteristics that distinguish them from conventional sources: directivity, the ability to operate in pulse mode with very short durations, and monochromaticity. This last property is probably the least useful in medicine, since biological molecules have a broad absorption spectrum, and their activation does not require a spectrally narrow source.

Medical applications were soon found for this new instrument. The ruby laser was used as early as 1961 by Campbell in ophthalmology and in 1963 by Goldman in dermatology. The ionized argon laser (488-514 nm) soon became the laser of choice for the treatment of retinal detachment. The carbon dioxide laser (CO ₂ ), introduced by Polanyi and Kaplan in 1965 and 1967, was first offered to surgeons with the concept of an "optical" scalpel. It has since been used in a wide range of indications, particularly in dermatology. The use of fiber optics in the 1970s opened up the field of endocavitary laser applications, thanks to the possibility of introducing the fiber into the operating channel of an endoscope. Here again, the argon laser (Dwyer in 1975), but above all the Nd:YAG laser (Kiefhaber in 1975), were used in gastroenterology, pneumology and other fields. In 1976, Hofstetter used the laser for the first time in urology. Thanks to...