All light generates electrical signals in the retina at the back of your eye and in the cortex region of your brain.
Red and blue lights generate the largest signals. Green light generates the smallest signals. This is probably why it’s less likely to bother people with photophobia. For some people, migraine symptoms may even improve.
Green light therapy is more than just a green light bulb or a green glow. Instead, it involves a specific, narrow band of green light from a special lamp. You have to spend time in this green light while filtering out all other light.
But what is really known about green light therapy? Is it a viable option for easing the intensity of migraine attacks?
What does the research say?
Many people with migraine experience photophobia, which can exacerbate pain.
A 2016 studyTrusted Source found that green light is significantly less likely to exacerbate migraine attacks than white, blue, amber, or red. Almost 80 percent of study participants reported intensified symptoms with every color except green, which only affected half as many. Twenty percent of participants reported that green light reduced migraine pain.
The researchers suggest that at low intensities and filtering out all other light, green light may lessen the intensity of photophobia and migraine pain.
A 2017 study involved three groups of rats with neuropathic pain.
One group was bathed in green light from LED strips. A second group was exposed to room light and contact lenses allowing the green spectrum wavelength to pass through. A third group had opaque contact lenses that blocked green light.
Both groups exposed to green light benefited, with effects lasting 4 days from the last exposure. The group that was deprived of green light saw no benefit. No side effects were observed.
It’s thought that green light may increase certain pain-relieving chemicals in the brain.
A small, randomized, clinical trial is currently being carried out that focuses on fibromyalgia and migraine pain. Participants will use an LED green light strip at home every day for 10 weeks. Then their level of pain, use of pain relievers, and quality of life will be assessed. {read}