Methods and apparatus for removal of skin pigmentation and tattoo ink

A laser apparatus for dermatological treatment, in which the laser apparatus includes a computer system and moveable optical components which are controllable by the computer system, wherein the laser apparatus is arranged to emit a beam of laser light pulses, the laser light pulses being less than one nanosecond in duration;

• wherein the computer system is configured to control movement of the optical components to deflect the beam of laser light pulses to follow a predetermined scanning path over a treatment area of skin of a person such that successive laser light pulses fall on non-overlapping skin portions of the skin of the person along the predetermined scanning path, wherein a fluence delivered to the skin portions of the person is in the range of 0.5-10 J/cm2;
• the apparatus including a camera arranged to take images of the treatment area;
• wherein the computer system is configured to receive one or more images of the treatment area from the camera, to process the received images to determine a shape of at least part of an area to be treated, to adjust the size and/or shape of a scanning field according to the determined shape of the at least part of the area to be treated and to scan the laser beam over the scanning field.

A computer program product embodied on a non-transitory storage medium, the computer program product executable on a processor of a computer system to perform a method for controlling operation of a laser apparatus for dermatological treatment, in which the laser apparatus includes the computer system and moveable optical components which are controlled by the computer system, the computer program product executable on the processor of the computer system to:

• (i) process received camera images of a treatment area to determine a shape of at least part of an area to be treated, to adjust the size and/or shape of a scanning field according to the determined shape of the at least part of the area to be treated, and (ii) control movement of the optical components to deflect a beam of laser light pulses emitted by the laser apparatus to follow a predetermined scanning path over the scanning field of treatment area skin of a person such that successive laser light pulses fall on non-overlapping skin portions of the skin of the person along the predetermined scanning path.