Tag: Washington DC vein specialists

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Specialists from a Top Vein Center in Montgomery County Answer the Question, “What Increases My Risk For Varicose Veins?”

Top Vein Center in Montgomery County: Risk Factors
Top Vein Center in Montgomery County: Risk Factors

Varicose veins aren’t communicable like colds, and they don’t develop as a direct result of doing something or not doing something else. Instead, when we talk about the things that increase your possibility of developing varicose veins, we have to talk about risk factors. All of the risk factors we are going to discuss in this article increase your likelihood of getting varicose veins. Some of them you can’t do anything about to lower your risk, and others you can.

The risk factors you can’t do anything to change

Although some people get varicose veins in their 20s or 30s, most develop them later in life, so your age is one of the most important risk factors. While only 1 in 20 women under 24 have varicose veins, over 50% of women over 65 have them. Another important risk factor is your gender, because for hormonal reasons more women develop varicose veins than men. This is even truer if you have become pregnant and given birth, or if you are taking birth control pills or are undergoing hormone replacement therapy.

Finally, the third major risk factor that you’re stuck with and can’t do anything to influence one way or another is your genetics. Vein disease is hereditary, so if your parents, siblings, and grandparents had varicose veins, you have a much higher risk of developing them yourself. To a lesser extent, some diseases – such as diabetes, inflammatory vasculitis, atherosclerosis, and metabolic syndrome – increase your risk of developing varicose veins as well.

What are the risk factors that Washington DC residents can reduce?

According to Washington DC vein specialists, the varicose vein risk factor that you can do the most to eliminate – and quickly – is smoking. Smoking cigarettes is not only bad for your lungs and for your heart, it’s terrible for your veins. Quitting smoking can cut your overall varicose vein risk in half. And because varicose veins are partly caused by pressure inside your veins, and because every extra pound you carry around increases that pressure, the next most important risk factor you can lower is being overweight, or obese. Losing weight significantly lowers your risk of developing chronic venous insufficiency, the condition that causes varicose veins.

Losing weight can also help you reduce one of the other most significant risk factors – not only for varicose veins but for dozens of other diseases as well – inactivity. And by inactivity we don’t just mean “not getting enough aerobic exercise,” although that is very important. Just as dangerous when it comes to varicose vein risk is sitting too much. If you have a job that requires you to sit at a desk all day or while traveling, finding ways to take “walking breaks” or “stretching breaks” throughout the day can significantly lower your overall risk.

If you have many of the risk factors we’ve listed, does that mean that you will need to visit a top vein center in Montgomery County?

Not necessarily. Having a large number of relevant risk factors makes you more likely to develop varicose veins than someone who doesn’t, but it doesn’t mean that you “have to” develop them. Lifestyle changes such as smoking cessation, weight loss, and increased exercise can greatly reduce your risk, and even have a balancing effect on some of the risk factors in the first group, such as your age and genetic history.

Your Washington DC varicose vein doctor can also help you with diet, exercise, and lifestyle recommendations that can help to keep you healthy. For example, if your job requires you to sit or stand for long periods of time, you can reduce your risk by wearing compression stockings, or by spending some time each day with your legs elevated to improve circulation. So if you are interested in learning ways to reduce your risk of developing varicose veins, our advice is to seek vein disease treatment in Washington DC, and to seek it sooner rather than later. The earlier you start to eliminate risks, the more likely you are to remain healthy.

Vein Clinic in the Washington DC Metro Area: New Article
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A Washington DC Metro Area Vein Clinic Explains That Varicose Veins May Be Commonplace, But They’re Not “Just a Cosmetic Concern”

Washington DC Metro Area Vein Clinic on Dangerous Veins
Washington DC Metro Area Vein Clinic on Dangerous Veins

In our experience providing varicose vein treatment options in Washington DC, we have learned that most of our new patients come to us burdened with two common misunderstandings – how commonplace varicose veins are, and how dangerous they are. Because these patients invariably have to overcome these incorrect beliefs before they can fully benefit from treatment, we thought we’d deal with these two misunderstanding in this article aimed at the general public.

First, varicose veins are much more commonplace than you think

If you have varicose veins, you can possibly understand why people think they aren’t as common as they really are. How many times have you looked at your legs in the mirror, seen the swollen, discolored veins there, and reached instinctively for your long pants or darkest stockings to cover them up? Well, millions of other people do exactly the same thing, hiding their conditions, but at the same time giving the false impression that varicose veins are rare.

They aren’t. 40% of women over 50 and 20% of women under 40 have varicose veins, and that’s just the women – 20% of men over 50 have varicose veins, too. And while it is true that for hormonal reasons older women have varicose veins more often than younger women, a surprising number of people in their twenties or thirties develop varicose veins, too, especially after having been pregnant or if their jobs require them to stand or sit most of the day with no other exercise.

Second, varicose veins are also much more dangerous than you think

The widespread belief that varicose veins aren’t to be taken seriously and that you can easily “live with them” just by keeping your legs covered and pretending they aren’t there is dangerously false. While varicose veins are rarely considered medically dangerous in themselves, the disease that causes them (chronic venous insufficiency, or CVI) is very much a real disease that causes impairment to your circulatory and immune systems. The swollen veins that you see on the surface of your skin mean that your veins are not working properly beneath the surface, and this affects many aspects of your overall health.

Left untreated, varicose veins DON’T go away, or “get better on their own.” They get worse. The first symptoms will likely be that your legs feel tired and weak all the time, often so much that you can no longer stand or walk easily. Next, your legs and ankles can become painfully swollen, again reducing your mobility. If you continue to ignore the growing list of symptoms, soon varicose veins can become infected, causing the skin that covers them to become tough, leathery, and prone to injuries that can literally leave your legs covered with open sores and bleeding leg ulcers that refuse to heal. And all of these symptoms still aren’t the worst part of the dangers of varicose veins – left untreated, they so radically impair your immune system that your risk for developing more serious diseases like heart attack, stroke, and diabetes increases tremendously.

So what should you do if you have varicose veins?

You should seek vein treatment from one of the best vein centers in Washington DC. The many advances made in medicine in recent decades has made it possible for Washington DC vein specialists to detect vein diseases in less than an hour, by performing a painless, non-invasive venous health screening. If this screening reveals that you have vein diseases such as varicose veins or CVI, these conditions can be eliminated almost as quickly, using painless, minimally-invasive treatments that are so safe that they can be performed in the comfort of your Washington DC metro area vein clinic. If the screening reveals that you don’t have vein disease yet but are at high risk of developing it because of genetic or lifestyle issues, the doctors at Cardiac Associates, P.C. can help you prevent it from developing, and help you to stay healthy. So give us a call today and set up an appointment for your own venous health screening.