Abstract. Medium- and high-power Nd:YAG lasers are widely used in many industrial processes and in several applications in the biomedical field. Keeping in mind the high power levels involved in these applications, improvement in laser delivery safety in order to reduce the risks of damage to the system and accidents for users is of great interest. An original method is presented for detecting optical-fibre damage or other kinds of failure in the delivery system. By exploiting the results of this method, a control device suitable for fibre-optic Nd:YAG laser delivery has been designed and constructed.
