Effect of Low-Level Laser Therapy on Pain Experienced During Leveling and Alignment of Lower Anterior Teeth: A Randomized Controlled Clinical Study

Objective: This study investigated the effect of a 635 nm Gallium-Aluminum-Arsenide (Ga-Al-As) laser on pain perception during the leveling and alignment of lower anterior teeth. Subjects and Methods: This two parallel arms randomized controlled clinical study included 28 patients (17 females and 11 males) who underwent leveling and alignment through a non-extraction approach during treatment. They were randomly divided according to low-level laser therapy (LLLT) into two groups: non-laser group and laser group. Both groups started the leveling stage using 0.012-inch Ni-Ti archwires. The laser group was exposed to LLLT by (Ga-Al-As) semiconductor diode laser with 635 nm wavelength, 6.5J/cm2energy density, for 10 seconds on 10 points distributed over the labial and lingual aspects of each root of the lower anterior teeth. This was started immediately after archwire insertion and then at days 3,7,14, 28 of the first month. Each patient was provided with a visual analog scale (VAS) to record the pain score at 4 hours, 6 hours, 24 hours, 3 days, 7 days, and 28 days. Results: The results show a statistically non-significant increase at 6 and 24 hours and a decrease in the mean degree of pain measurements after day 3. Conclusions: the present study, demonstrated that there is no statistically significant difference in pain experienced during the initial phase of leveling and alignment between both laser and non-laser groups.