Category: News
A Vein Clinic in Rockville, MD Lists 4 Questions to Ask Your Doctor about Varicose Veins
The first time you visit a specialist in varicose vein treatment in Rockville, MD, the doctor will ask you a number of questions about you and your family’s health history, and about the symptoms you have been experiencing. The doctor will also perform a number of tests to evaluate your vein health and will present the findings to you. At this point, however, there are a number of questions that you should ask.
- “What’s the verdict? Do I have vein disease or not?”
This may seem like an obvious question, since the reason you are seeing a vein doctor is to find the answer to it, but you would be surprised how many patients fail to ask it. This is your opportunity to find out whether the symptoms you’ve noticed are the result of vein disease or not.
- “If I don’t have vein disease currently, what can I do to prevent it?”
If your Rockville varicose vein doctor answers the first question with a “No,” the most important thing you need to know is whether you are at risk of developing vein disease in the future. Factors that increase your vein disease risk include, obesity, a family history of varicose veins or other vein diseases, and inactivity. If your examination shows that you are at higher than normal risk, your doctor can present to you ways to reduce that risk and keep your veins healthy.
- “If I do have vein disease, what are my treatment options?”
If the answer to that first question was “Yes, you have vein disease,” your next question should be, “OK, so what can we do about it?” If your vein disease is mild, the doctor may recommend conservative treatments involving diet, exercise, and wearing compression stockings. If your vein disease is more advanced, or if you want to eliminate your varicose veins permanently, there are treatment options to do this. When the doctor presents treatment options to you, you should ask follow-up questions like:
- “How long does each of these types of treatment take?”
- “Will their effects be permanent or temporary?”
- “How long will it be before I see results?”
- “What would be the result of avoiding or delaying treatment?”
This, interestingly enough, is one of the most important questions you should ask. Many patients, when they first learn that they have varicose veins or other kinds of vein disease, tend to “put off” having them treated, thinking that the diseases are not serious. This is a mistake. Varicose veins, for example, don’t go away if you ignore them, or “get better on their own.” They get worse, and often much worse. Asking this question allows you to find out how much worse they can get, and what the consequences will be if you delay treatment.
Whatever your questions are, remember we’re here to answer them
At the top vein center in Rockville, we want our patients to be fully informed at every step of diagnosis and treatment, so they can make the best decisions about their own vein health. So when you call us at 301-637-3088 to set up an appointment, feel free to ask us any question you want, and we’ll do our best to answer them.
Informational Free Vein Screening on Wednesday, October 5th
Specialists from a Vein Clinic in Rockville, MD Explain What a Day in the Life of a Vein Doctor Is Like
Dr. Hamza Rana, medical director of Venous Health Centers, has cared for many, many patients during his many years of experience. Certified by both the American Board of Venous and Lymphatic Medicine and the American Board of Vascular Medicine, he has helped thousands of patients with a wide range of venous problems. In this article, we present a short “sneak peek” into the daily life of the physician that many consider the best vein doctor in Germantown, MD.
What is it like to be a varicose vein doctor in Rockville?
Daily life for Dr. Rana is very much in tune with his philosophy as a doctor, dedicated to giving every patient who walks into his offices the best care possible. But while specialized procedures such as endovenous radiofrequency ablation, ultrasound-guided sclerotherapy, microphlebectomy, and endovenous laser treatment take up some of his daily practice, these treatments represent only a portion of the work he actually does.
A good deal of his time, for example, is devoted to patient education. This is a necessity because there is SO much misinformation in the media and on the Internet about vein disease that Dr. Rana feels an obligation to counter it with real facts when speaking with his patients or when writing articles for this website.
He has found, for example, that many patients still feel that varicose veins are harmless and primarily a “cosmetic problem.” This is a dangerous misconception, because it often tempts people to put off having their varicose veins treated. Dr. Rana tries to educate his patients about what they risk by doing this – that left untreated, varicose veins can escalate and render them unable to walk or stand for more than a few minutes, and become effectively disabled.
Patient education also helps to prevent vein disease
Another aspect of what our vein specialist in Germantown, MD does on a daily basis is to give advice to patients who come in for a venous health screening. Many of these patients don’t have varicose veins or other vein diseases YET, but his tests show that they have a very high risk of developing it in the future. With these patients, Dr. Rana works to prevent vein disease by helping patients reduce risks from smoking, from being overweight, and from inactivity and sitting too much. In a very real sense, by doing this Dr. Rana is providing the best possible varicose vein treatment in Rockville, MD by helping to prevent the varicose veins from forming.
So as you can see, there are many different aspects to being a varicose vein doctor in Montgomery County. But all of them center on providing the best vein care possible for his patients. If you’d like to become one of them, please give us a call at 301-637-3088 and set up an appointment for your venous health screening. You’ll be glad you did.
A Vein Clinic in Rockville, MD Explains “Vein Disease Treatment for Everyone”
Just to make things clear right from the start, if you are reading this article, It is more likely, in fact, that you are a smart person who cares about your health and wants to get the facts about health issues that concern you. Furthermore, if you’re reading this article on this website, chances are you have spider veins or varicose veins and want to understand more of the facts about vein disease treatment, because these issues concern you personally.
Well, you’ve come to the right place. We’re writing this article because at our vein clinic in Rockville, MD, we understand your desire to cut through the misinformation and the jargon and just “get the facts.” So here they are.
Let’s start at the beginning – what exactly IS vein disease?
The term “vein disease” refers to a number of malfunctions of your circulatory system that occur as the result of aging, genetics, accidents, medications, or lifestyle choices. These malfunctions damage the delicate network of blood vessels that carry deoxygenated blood back to your heart and lungs for renewal.
Some types of vein disease have visible symptoms. For example, the symptoms of a disease called chronic venous insufficiency (CVI) appear as varicose veins and spider veins. Other types of vein disease may have no visible symptoms but can be much more dangerous. For example, deep vein thrombosis (DVT) has no overt symptoms, but causes over 300,000 deaths per year.
How do varicose vein doctors in Rockville diagnose and treat vein disease?
Because diseases of the veins “hide” beneath the surface of the skin, diagnosis requires specialized equipment such as Doppler ultrasound, which allows doctors to look beneath the surface of the skin and actually visualize the blood as it flows through your veins. Ultrasound is non-invasive, so when it is used in a venous health screening to detect disease, the whole process is painless.
If the screening detects the presence of vein disease, the procedures used to treat it are equally painless – they can be performed in the comfort of one of the top vein centers in Rockville, with no need for hospitals, general anesthesia, or deep incisions. Modern vein treatments are minimally-invasive, which means that the doctor inserts a tiny needle into the diseased veins to treat or close them. This process is so fast and gentle that some patients actually have their varicose veins removed on their lunch hour, and then return to work. Spider vein treatment in Potomac, MD can be even faster and easier.
Aren’t varicose veins and other vein disease “just a cosmetic issue?”
Not at all. Yes, varicose veins and the smaller spider veins are unattractive, so removing them has a cosmetic “payoff” for patients. But the primary reason we recommend varicose vein removal is to eliminate the vein disease that causes them, and which – if left untreated – can quickly cause your legs to become so painfully swollen, tired, and weak that you can no longer walk.
So how do I find out more about vein disease, and whether I have it?
This is actually the easiest part of our short “Vein Disease Treatment for Dummies” course. If you are concerned that you might need varicose vein treatment in Rockville, MD, all you need to do to find for sure is pick up your telephone and call us at 301-637-3088 to schedule a venous health screening. You’ll be happy you did.
A Washington DC Vein Specialist Explains How Swollen Legs and Ankles Can Impact Your Overall Health
Do you have chronically swollen legs and ankles? Aren’t they a real bother? The swelling makes it difficult to walk or to stand for long periods of time, and it’s often painful as well. But it’s nothing to worry about – probably just a “sign of aging” or something like that, right?
Wrong. According to our Washington DC vein specialist, chronic swelling in your legs and ankles can be a sign of a more serious condition – vein disease. And vein disease is very much a real disease, one that can escalate and negatively impact your overall state of health and well-being.
What Washington DC residents should know about swollen legs and ankles
One of the most common causes of swollen legs and ankles is a condition called chronic venous insufficiency (CVI), in which the tiny valves that enable your veins to pump blood back to the heart and lungs become damaged or diseased and stop working properly. CVI negatively affects your entire circulatory system, and thus your overall state of health.
Healthy veins have the job of conveying de-oxygenated blood back to your heart and lungs, where it is re-oxygenated and then sent back through the arteries to your organs and other parts of the body. If your veins are damaged from CVI and failing to do this job, a crucial part of your body’s circulatory system is failing.
An early symptom of this failure is swelling in the legs and ankles, but left undiagnosed and untreated, the impact of CVI can quickly become much worse. For example, CVI is the most common cause of varicose veins, which if untreated can become tough, distended, and covered with skin ulcers that resist topical treatment and fail to heal. CVI is also related to more serious diseases such as deep vein thrombosis (DVT), and puts you at risk of developing blood clots in the large veins of your legs. If these clots break loose from where they formed and travel to the lungs and brain, the results can actually be fatal.
But even “just” swollen legs and ankles can disrupt your health
When swelling and accompanying discomfort and pain occurs in your legs and ankles, you start to become less mobile, and get less exercise. Inactivity has a profound effect on your overall health, and has been cited as a major cause of conditions such as diabetes, obesity, and heart disease. If the pain and discomfort become severe, you may start to miss work and want to spend less time with your friends and family. And on a psychological level, those feelings of not wanting to go out erode your self-confidence and make it a struggle to get out of bed in the mornings. Normal activities become huge tasks, and you become even more sedentary, which further erodes your mental and physical health.
What can you do about it?
The first thing you should do if you suffer from swollen legs and ankles is find out what the cause is. And this is as simple as scheduling a venous health screening at one of the best vein centers in Washington DC. These screenings are fast, painless, non-invasive, and above all, effective. Using modern diagnostic tools such as Doppler ultrasound, Dr. Hamza Rana can see beneath the skin, and detect any blockages or disease in your veins. If vein disease is found, treatment is equally fast, equally painless, and can be performed right in our Rockville varicose vein doctor’s offices. So give Dr. Hamza Rana a call today at 301-637-3088 and set up an appointment for a venous health screening. You’ll be happy you did.
Varicose vein doctor in Rockville Explains How Vein Disease Is Detected and Diagnosed
To get an idea of the incredible progress that medical science has made in the field of vascular medicine in recent decades, just look at how vein disease was diagnosed only a few years ago. At that time, if you suspected you had vein problems, you often had to go to a hospital, undergo general anesthesia, and submit to invasive and often painful diagnostic procedures just to find out whether you were sick.
Medical technology has come a long way since then, and the techniques used to diagnose vein disease are now nothing like this. Visualization technologies such as Doppler ultrasound allow vein experts in the Rockville area to look below the surface of the skin to get a clear picture of how well your veins are functioning without making a single incision, and without the need for anesthesia. In fact, a venous health screening at a top vein center in Montgomery County takes only about an hour, and is completely painless and non-invasive.
What a venous health screening is like – what to expect
As performed by Dr. Hamza Rana and his associates at Venous Health Centers, your vein health checkup starts with the doctor asking you to describe your symptoms, your medical history, and (because vein disease is hereditary) your family’s medical history. Dr. Rana may also ask questions about your general lifestyle, because factors such as whether you have given birth or are taking hormonal drugs or birth control pills, how much exercise you get, and whether you smoke all represent significant risk factors for vein disease.
This is usually followed by a general physical examination, during which the doctor assesses your overall health and then performs a number of non-invasive diagnostic tests based on your replies to the earlier questions.. Finally, if the initial questions indicate that you have a higher-than-normal risk of developing vein disease, the doctor will schedule Doppler ultrasound to examine your veins directly. Painless ultrasound scans allow your doctor to detect any structural abnormalities, but also allow him to see if blood is flowing properly through the veins, or whether there are obstructions such as blood clots that could be blocking the flow.
That’s it? I thought it would be more traumatic than that
Many people – especially those who have heard horror stories from their mothers about what vein treatment was like “in their day” – have fears about what to expect if they see a vein doctor. That’s why we write informative articles like this, to clear up misconceptions about vein disease and how it’s diagnosed.
If you’re happy to hear that the vein screenings are this fast and painless, you’ll probably be even happier to learn that actual treatment of vein diseases is equally fast and painless. The treatments we offer to eliminate varicose veins, spider veins, or dangerous blood clots can all be performed in the comfort of our vein clinic in the Rockville in about an hour, and with no need to ever go to a hospital or submit to invasive surgery.
So if you’re ready to find out the exact status of your vein health, just pick up a phone and give our Rockville vein specialist a call today at 301-637-3088 to set up an appointment for your own venous health screening. You’ll be happy you did.