Like plants, our bodies need light. If plants wither in its absence, our metabolism slows down and functions slow down. Fortunately, there is a way to make up for daylight: phototherapy (light therapy - therapy that heals)

How long has phototherapy been available?

Since ancient times, light has been used for its virtues. But recently, in the early 1980s, a group of researchers at the US Institute of Mental Health had a bold idea - if people are more depressed when they lack sunlight, why not be permanently exposed to it? They did an experiment on a friend, a 63-year-old man, who experienced deep depression every year with the onset of winter. First they made a light-catching device out of a metal box covered with a protective plastic screen that filters out ultraviolet rays. Inside the box were special tubes. Thus the first light therapy lamp was born.

What conditions can light therapy cure?

30 years later, light therapy has become the standard treatment for seasonal depression. To understand how this therapy works, it is important to first understand the normal biological mechanism at the time of the year when we have sufficient sunlight. Our hypothalamus, located in the brain, interprets the level of light, and when it decreases it triggers the secretion of a hormone (melatonin) that prepares our body for sleep. This is why when there is insufficient light, during the cold season and the rainy, dark days of fall and spring, melatonin secretion is excessive, causing what we call seasonal depression.

The aim of light therapy is to regulate the level of melatonin production in the body, despite low natural brightness. Light therapy, also called phototherapy, consists of daily exposure for half an hour - 10 000 lux to two hours - 2 500 lux - to a special light therapy lamp. Light therapy lamps must be medically approved and meet certain quality standards.    

Light therapy is used to treat seasonal depression, but also biological clock disturbances or problems caused by time zone differences or working the night shift. It also works to treat sleep disorders (insomnia and chronic fatigue) and postnatal depression. 

The people most affected by the absence of light are women and children, as well as those whose work is carried out in artificially lighted spaces. Such activities are office work and work in commercial premises. Another category of people affected are the hospitalized sick and the elderly who cannot go out in the sunlight.