Is it safe to get IPL treatments when pregnant?

You can typically have laser treatments during pregnancy, but any upstanding facility would request your primary care doctor give you a note okaying the service. Most facilities should restrict pregnant & nursing mothers from services without physician permission or just restrict it altogether.

I do not recommend IPL for pregnant women.  The hormonal changes of pregnancy can alter the effect of the broad band light therapy and result in stimulation of pigmentation, and accelerate or precipitate melasma.
There is no danger to the baby.

In my opinion, although Intense Pulsed Light treatments have not been shown to cause side effects during pregnancy, I never perform this procedure (or just about any Cosmetic Medicine procedure) on pregnant patients.

Keep in mind that more pigment may show up on your face during pregnancy, so IPL may be of higher yield after pregnancy. That's another reason to wait.

Your first trimester is when the fetus inside you is developing the most. This is the time to maximize chances for a healthy baby. Follow your OB doctor's advice, stay healthy, and save the IPL treatments for after pregnancy.

Hi Kerry,

Even though it is probably not risky to undergo IPL when you're pregnant, we do not know this for sure. There have been no studies proving conclusively that it is safe, so I usually tell people to wait until after pregnancy to undergo laser treatment.

Also, during pregnancy, your skin is going to go through a lot of changes that will resolve by themselves after you deliver. It may be a waste of money to do IPL only to have your skin get worse as a result of the pregnancy. So, I would wait until afterward. Hope that helps!