Comparison of the efficacy and safety of home-used intense pulsed light with medical intense pulsed light for hair removal.

Although many home-used intense pulsed light (IPL) are available for hair removal, whether these devices exhibit comparable efficacy and safety to those IPL used at hospitals is unknown. Therefore, we compared here the efficacy and safety of a home-used UI04 IPL freezing point hair removal device with a Broadband Light (BBL) intense pulsed light hair removal device for hair removal. A total of 84 participants were enrolled from our outpatient clinic. In each participant, the right and the left sides of the axilla, calf, or forearm were randomly assigned to either the observation side treated with a UI04 IPL hair removal device or control side treated with a BBL device for 3 months and were followed up for 3 months. Our results showed that 78 out of 84 (87.6%) patients completed the study. After 1-month treatment, the effective rate of hair removal was significantly higher on the observation side than on the control side (P = 0.001). After 3-month treatment, the effective rates on the observation and the control sides were comparable. The incidence of adverse reactions was similar between the two instruments. Thus, the UI04 IPL and BBL IPL hair removal device exhibit similar efficacy and safety for hair removal.This study confirms that the efficacy and safety of the UI04 IPL as an at-home hair removal device is similar to that of IPL devices, while they are inexpensive, easy to operate, portable, and can be used as an alternative treatment for hair removal. Trial registration 20210454.