Living with varicose veins

Varicose veins, popularly called spider veins, varicoses or varicosities is a condition that is extremely common in women and it refers to a situation where the veins become enlarged, dilated, and overfilled with blood and appear swollen with bluish-purple or red colour on the lower legs.

It is said that about 25 per cent of all adults have varicose veins and they are often painful. Simply put, varicose veins occur when veins aren’t functioning in the proper manner; veins are designed in a manner of one-way valves to prevent blood from flowing backward and when the valves fail, blood begins to collect in the veins rather than continuing toward the heart, causing pain and swelling.

Though many have varicose veins, some factors have been identified as likely causes. They include menopause, obesity, heredity, pregnancy, old age and standing for long periods of time among others.

The obvious symptoms of varicose veins are misshapen, swollen and coloured veins, usually on the legs associated with pain, heaviness and achiness around the enlarged veins. Atimes, the swelling comes with discoloration and in some cases, bleeding which leads to ulcers.

The treatment of varicose veins is usually conservative and commonly attached to lifestyle changes to manage the condition, rather than aggressive treatments that may have other hazardous effects. Changes that can be made to lifestyle include exercises that improve blood circulation, working to reduce weight, wearing compression socks to put pressure on legs so that blood can flow more easily to your heart and decrease swelling and avoiding situations where one stands for long periods of time.

In serious cases, when or if lifestyle changes fail, and varicose veins are causing a lot of damage to overall health, an invasive surgery; vein ligation and stripping may be recommended to remove varicose vein. Also, treatments like laser surgery that is, using light energy to block vein, endovenous ablation therapy, using heat and radiofrequency waves sclerotherapy, using liquid or foam chemical injection to block off a larger vein, endoscopic vein surgery, using a small lighted scope inserted through a small incision to block off a vein or microsclerotherapy, using a liquid chemical injection to block off smaller veins may be deployed.

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Because varicose veins gets worse over time, it is important to maintain a healthy lifestyle so it doesn’t get worse because it cannot be prevented as it develops as a result of risk factors like being a woman, pregnancy, obesity, age, family history, hormonal replacement or contraception therapy. But while one cannot prevent varicose veins from forming, it can be prevented from getting worse.

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