Patient Information Overview
If you suffer from varicose
veins, you’re a member of a very large club. Some 25 million Americans
face a daily struggle with the swollen, ropey veins that can cause throbbing pain,
severe swelling, and heavy, tired legs.
Half of all Americans over 50, and two-thirds of women over 60, have the condition. And
many have dealt with it for decades, because varicose veins can appear even in teenagers
too young to vote.
Heredity is a factor in venous
reflux disease – if your parents or siblings have had varicose veins, you're
more likely to develop them – and people who are obese or have had multiple
pregnancies are particularly susceptible, because the extra weight adds strain to
the veins. Women are more vulnerable to the problem than men, partly because the
hormonal changes brought on by menstruation, menopause and hormone-based drug therapy
can relax vein walls and cause venous reflux.
Your lifestyle, particularly physical activity, can affect your odds of developing varicose
veins as well. People whose careers require them to stand in place for long periods of
time – nurses, teachers, waitresses, flight attendants and other service personnel,
for example – have a higher-than-average risk of venous disease. So do people who
do a good deal of heavy lifting.
Once it appears, venous reflux disease never goes away by itself – it's a progressive
condition that can only worsen unless treated. Fortunately, the minimally-invasive, device-based
advances in medical technology that have so profoundly impacted heart, lung and brain
surgery in recent years are now having a similarly revolutionary impact on the treatment
of varicose veins. The next-generation VNUS
ClosureFAST™ catheter represents the cutting edge of that technology.
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