Investigation of different modalities of laser delivery for skin welding

980-nm laser skin welding studies have been performed since 2005 by our group and promising results were obtained. As a continuation of that study, in this current research, it was aimed to compare 2 different application methods by histological and mechanical tests. 1-cm long, 6 incisions were welded with 980-nm diode laser by two different applications: high power (6W-400 ms) and low power (0.5 W - 5 s). Throughout 21-day healing period, incision were removed from dorsal skin of Wistar rats under anesthesia on control days (1
^st
, 4
^th
, 7
^th
, 14
^th
and 21
^st
) for histology and mechanical tests. Closure index, thermally altered areas, epidermal thickness and granulation areas of H&E stained samples were calculated. Breaking point of incisions during mechanical tensile test that has 5 mm / min crosshead speed was noted. In this study, effects of high (6 W - 400 ms) and low power (0.5 W- 5 s) applications of same energy level (2.5 J) 980-nm diode laser irradiation on skin tissue was shown.