Posts Tagged Treatment Of Spider Veins
Spider Vein Prevention
Posted by admin in Spider Veins on January 23, 2009
Patients often ask if there is anything that may be done to prevent the occurrence of new spider veins. The truth is the most important thing you can do to prevent spider veins is to choose your parents well. This is a joke, of course, but just as there is little you can do about choosing your parents so also there is little else you can do to prevent spider veins from appearing. Wearing compression stockings or taking supplements advertised for that purpose have not been shown to reduce their appearance. Treatment of spider veins that currently exist slows the process but does not prevent other spider veins that were destined to fail from gradually appearing. For this reason, most patients who elect to undertake the treatment of spider veins will need a single treatment session or, in more advanced cases, two sessions, every year or two to maintain what they have achieved. This is because the genetic “seed” is still in the veins. However, leaving the problem alone only allows it to worsen.
Treatment of spider veins Part 2
Posted by admin in Spider Veins on January 19, 2009
Prior to sclerotherapy a patient’s legs need to be examined by ultrasound to make certain that the larger and deeper saphenous vein system and its tributaries are functioning normally. This is a common reason for sclerotherapy “failure” for if these larger veins are also failing then attempts to treat the visible surface veins alone are destined to fail as the larger “root” saphenous system will cause the surface veins to reopen and possibly look even worse.
Another common reason found for unsatisfactory results from sclerotherapy is doing too little treatment or doing a single treatment. A “little bit” of sclerotherapy is analogous to shooting a tiger with a 22 calibre rifle. You are doing the right thing but don’t have nearly enough firepower. Just as using too little sclerosant is ineffective so also is doing a single treatment Treating spider veins is like painting a room a new color. A first coat of paint changes the color of the room but once it dries the old color still shows through in spots. A second coat is what makes all the difference in appearance. Successive treatment sessions of sclerotherapy is always the standard of successful treatment.
The effect of sclerotherapy is that the leg both looks and feels better. Common temporary adverse side effects include some hyperpigmentation developing over large clusters of treated spider veins or larger varicose veins. This occurs because the sclerotherapy causes the vein to shut down with some blood within the vein. As the blood breaks down along with the vein iron from the hemoglobin can cause a slight brown area to develop in the skin, the “ghost” of the treated vein. These areas of hyperpigmentation are temporary in the majority of patients but up to 4% of patients can have some small residual areas of hyperpigmentation lasting even 24 months after treatment. This hyperpigmentation is more common in patients with skin that is dark or that tans very readily. For that reason patients are asked to avoid intentionally tanning immediately after sclerotherapy.
Treatment of spider veins Part 1
Posted by admin in Spider Veins on January 18, 2009
Treatment can consist of a number of means. Elevating the legs reduces the congestion inside the veins and relieves symptoms. Compression stockings reduce the amount of blood that pools inside the veins and also reduces pain.
Definitive treatment consists of either injection therapy (sclerotherapy) or lasers. Lasers have been promoted by many manufacturers in the treatment of spider veins and many physicians, listening to them, have purchased these expensive machines and marketed them to their patients. Lasers have only had modest success in the treatment of spider veins in the legs, however, because the complex relationship of one cluster of spider veins to another on the leg causes untreated veins to flow back into areas treated by topical lasers andreopen. Consequently, many more treatments are necessary to gain a very modest amount of improvement. Also, patients are frequently surprised as to how painful the lasers. The lack of predictable or significant success has prompted the American College of Phlebology to recommend that lasers should be reserved for those patients with very small veins inaccessible to injection therapy or who are markedly needle phobic. Facial spider veins are preferentially treated with laser though they may be treated with sclerotherapy as well.
Sclerotherapy (injection therapy) remains the “gold standard” in the treatment of spider vein disease of the legs where most spider veins occur. Solutions injected inside the veins with very fine (30 gauge) needles cause the veins to scar shut and so the veins gradually wither away.
Part 2 of Treatment of spider veins will be here tomorrow!