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ePaper created 2017-06-15, 09:14:00 | version 1.38.0
| industry © Irina Bg/Shutterstock.com Laser-assisted herpes labialis therapy Simple, fast and long-lasting Author: Dr Darius Moghtader, Germany “Quae medicamenta non sanant, ferrum sanat, quae ferrum non sanat, ignis sanat” (What medicines cannot cure, iron cures; what iron cannot cure, fire cures)—When Hippocrates uttered these words around 400 BC, he must have thought of skin dis- eases, amongst others. What else can be cured by fire when iron and medicine fail? Readers will learn from the following description that the therapy described by Hippocrates can prove successful in the treatment of herpes simplex. And of course we will also reveal the meaning behind his statement, from which both doctor and patient can benefit even more than 2,400 years later. The term “herpes” is originated in Old Greek and actually described skin ulcers—an idea to which any person who has suffered from this viral disease, whose symptoms are often located in the lip area, can relate. When untreated, herpes labialis can be acute for up to ten days and undergoes seven phases in its course of disease. Those phase differ widely in their duration and severity. The first phase is the prodrome. Symptoms are pain, a tingling or burning sensation and sometimes an unpleasant feeling of tension in the yet intact ar- eas of the skin. Not all herpes labialis patients un- dergo this phase. The second phase, which is called erythema phase, the skin starts to redden. This is followed by painful papules (papula phase). In the vesicle phase, the papula transform into liquid-filled blisters. This liquid contains viruses and bears a great 22 laser 2 2017