Varicose Veins

Varicose Veins Description

Varicose veins are veins on the leg which are large, twisted, and ropelike, and can cause pain, swelling, or itching. They are an extreme form of telangiectasia, or spider veins.

Varicose Veins Causes

Vein gymnastics in the barefoot park Dornstetten, Germany.Varicose veins are more common in women than in men, and are linked with heredity. Other related factors are pregnancy, obesity, menopause, aging, prolonged standing, leg injury and abdominal straining. Varicose veins are bulging veins that are larger than spider veins, typically 3 mm or more in diameter.

The irritation -- especially the itching -- of varicose veins can be controlled to an extent with either of the following:

anti-inflammatory medication such as ibuprofen or aspirin -- but there is a risk of intestinal bleeding.
regular exercise, including vein gymnastics, wading through water and going barefoot.

Telangiectasias are small enlarged blood vessels near the surface of the skin, usually they measure only a few millimetres. They can develop anywhere on the body but commonly on the face around the nose, cheeks and chin.

These are actually developmental abnormalities but can closely mimic the behavior of benign vascular neoplasms. They may be composed of abnormal aggregations of arterioles, capillaries, or venules.

Features
Telangiectasias can result in nevus flammeus (port-wine stain), which is a flat birthmark on the head or neck that spontaneously regresses. A port-wine stain, if present, will grow proportionately with the child. There is a high association with Sturge-Weber syndrome, a nevus formation in the skin supplied by the trigeminal nerve and associated with glaucoma, meningeal angiomas, and mental retardation. Finally, spider telangiectasias are a radial array of tiny arterioles that commonly occur in pregnant women and in patients with hepatic cirrhosis. In men, they are related to high estrogen levels secondary to liver disease.

Varicose Veins Treatment

Telangiectasias are often treated with laser or IPL therapy

Sclerotherapy
This treatment is a non-surgical procedure in which a solution is injected into the problem varicose veins in order to cause its disappearance. 

Endovenous Laser treatment
EVLT works by heating the inside of the vein, which causes it to seal shut and disappear. This treatment requires that a very thin laser fiber be inserted into the damaged underlying vein.