Varicose veins are one of the most common vascular pathologies.
Varicose veins still bothered our ancestors, but then doctors tried unsuccessfully to defeat the disease. In our age, chronic venous insufficiency continues to disfigure beautiful female and male legs, however, modern medicine offers a whole host of ways to get rid of varicose veins on the legs.
According to some reports, more than 10% of the population suffers from the disease in one form or another, and women are more susceptible to it.
Varicose veins can occur at any age, even in childhood. Hereditary predisposition is a determining factor in the development of the disease.
Causes of varicose veins
The main cause of varicose veins is genetically determined imperfection of connective tissue, including the tissue that makes up the blood vessels. Hereditary predisposition means that if first-line relatives suffer from any form of varicose veins, the affected person is at risk for the disease.
The development of varicose veins also requires special conditions that are created by the patient’s lifestyle. These factors cause normal stagnation of the blood in the lower body, causing a static load.
Varicose veins in the legs often occur in people whose work involves a long-term job: hairdressers, shop assistants, operating surgeons.
Pelvic varicose veins can also be triggered by pregnancy, as an enlarged uterus can cause prolonged compression of the pelvic floor veins. In addition, pelvic varicose veins occur in people who live a sedentary lifestyle.
Factors that interfere with blood circulation and cause varicose veins in the legs include wearing tight clothing and shoes and sitting with crossed legs. The cause of pelvic varicose veins is incomplete intercourse as a method of contraception.
Symptoms of varicose veins
Symptoms of varicose veins in the legs include:
- Feeling very tired, heaviness and fullness in the legs, worse in the evening;
- Pain in the legs, which has no clear localization, is painful and pulling in nature, and the pain syndrome intensifies in the afternoon;
- Appearance of external symptoms of varicose veins in the legs. Tangle of thin, purple or cyanotic vessels in telangiectasias or spider veins. As the disease progresses, large veins begin to appear in the form of winding, swollen subcutaneous cords called worm-like veins;
- At an advanced stage, signs of complications of leg varicose are associated: thrombophlebitis, trophic ulcers, thrombosis. These are serious complications that cause a significant deterioration in the patient's quality of life (trophic ulcer) and, in some cases, death (pulmonary embolism due to venous thrombosis of the lower extremities).
The symptoms of pelvic varicose veins in women are not specific and are similar to the symptoms of inflammatory disease of the female genital tract, so they are often misdiagnosed.
The main symptoms of pelvic varicose veins are:
- Periodic painful pain in the pool area. The dependence of pain syndrome on the phase of the menstrual cycle can be traced, shortly before the onset of menstruation, the pain usually intensifies;
- Abundant mucous secretions from the vagina.
A special case of varicose veins in the pelvis, along with all the associated symptoms of hemorrhoids.
In men, the symptoms of testicular varicose veins are often not noticed at all and are accidentally discovered during a medical examination. Usually, it is a characteristic worm-like pattern of enlarged venous plexus on one side of the scrotum that draws one-sided pain in this area that appears after exertion.
Diagnosis of varicose veins
The diagnosis is based on the symptoms of varicose veins, external test data and the results of hardware research methods. In this quality, the most informative are Doppler ultrasound and duplex ultrasound angioscanning.
If pelvic varicose veins are difficult to diagnose in women, uterine phlebography may be used.
Special functional tests (such as the Valsava test) are used to confirm the diagnosis of testicular varicose veins.
Treatment of varicose veins
Treatment of varicose veins depends on the location of the pathology and may be conservative or surgical. The most commonly used combination.
Drug and compression therapy is used as a conservative treatment for leg varicose veins. Medication has no independent meaning, but it helps relieve the symptoms of varicose veins in the leg: relieve feelings of heaviness, fatigue, and pain.
Compression therapy involves wearing medical compression stockings that have a compressive and massaging effect on the superficial veins, helping to eliminate venous stagnation. Compression therapy is extremely effective and can be considered as an independent method of treating varicose veins in the early stages of development or in the postoperative period. Currently, medical compression stockings are made from high-tech materials and do not pose a problem during prolonged wear, including aesthetic wear.
The most radical treatment for all types of varicose veins is surgery. Today, phlebologists prefer minimally invasive techniques: varicose vein sclerosis, laser surgery, endoscopic phlebectomy, microsurgical vein phlebectomy. These techniques allow you to achieve excellent results with minimal risk of surgical and postoperative complications.
Classical surgical treatment of the varicose vein is also used, in which the injured part of the vein is ligated and excised. In this case, blood flow is bypassed.
It should be understood that modern treatment of varicose veins, with all its results, does not eliminate the main cause of the disease - the weakness of the vessel wall. Therefore, the treatment performed requires lifelong prevention of recurrence of the disease and, if possible, complete elimination of the factors that contribute to the development of varicose veins. Only this approach will allow a complete cure of the disease.
Application of folk remedies for the treatment of varicose veins
Folk remedies for varicose veins are widely used and actively used, but their effectiveness is generally insignificant. The use of folk remedies for varicose veins as symptomatic therapy is indicated to reduce the discomfort caused by the disease and its complications. Herbal decoctions and ointments, which have anti-inflammatory and antibacterial effects, are commonly used for this purpose.