Foot numbness, cramps in the afternoon, do not miss this pathology

14/12/2020 11:00

Foot numbness, cramps, heavy legs in the afternoon is the subjective symptoms cannot be ignored. You may have varicose veins. Failure to treat in time will clog blood vessels, causing danger to life.

 

1/4 of adults have varicose veins

 

Dr. Le Nhat Tien, MD, MA, Deputy chief of Internal Medicine, Cardiovascular Intervention – Respiratory, Viet Duc University Hospital shared, lower extremity varicose veins is a common disease in the community. Large studies in Europe and America show that about 40% of the adults are suffering from disease, costing treatment up to billions of dollars per year.

 

In Vietnam, about a quarter of adults have varicose veins and this disease is often neglected because there are many symptoms that are easily confused or subjectively ignored.

 

“Many people, when they feel numb in their legs, calf muscles, and cramps, often ignore the idea that it is a common disease. However, this disease needs to be early detected, easier for treatment”, said Dr. Tien.

 

Record at Viet Duc University Hospital, on average, 20 patients come to the clinic a day because of venous diseases, increasing over the years and rejuvenating gradually.

 

The proportion of patients who come to neurology or spinal specialist because of foot numbness or dermatology after completing the examination is quite high, about 20-30%.

 

According to Dr. Tien, this disease is more common in women than men because women often wear high heels, tight clothing, do a lot of standing work and especially, women have to go through the process of giving birth.

 

During pregnancy, a woman has limitations in the mechanism of blood transfer from legs to heart, and poor venous return. In particular, while lying down to rest or sleeping, pregnant women suffer from compression of thigh vein, pelvis. In addition, female hormones also were increased the susceptibility to varicose veins.

 

Viet Duc University Hospital has treated a young pregnant woman 24-year-old with severe varicose veins. She has varicose veins namely Spider Veins after giving birth to the first baby with worm-like appearance under the skin. During the 2nd childbirth, the dilatation worsens. Only one month after the baby was born, she had a vein thrombosis, which was life-threatening.

 

Recently, the hospital has coordinated with a number of schools to screen for teachers, showing that the percentage of teachers with varicose veins is higher than the general rate of the community, about 20-30%.

 

Legs numbness, afternoon cramps, do not ignore this pathology

 

 

How dangerous is varicose veins?

 

Dr. Le Nhat Tien, MD, MA said, lower limb varicose failure is a decrease in the ability to bring blood back to heart of lower limb vein system, leading to blood stagnation, causing changes in hemodynamic and deformation of surrounding tissues. The disease can lead to difficult to treat complications such as: eczema, foot ulcers that do not heal, bleeding, enlarged superficial veins, superficial thrombophlebitis, deep vein thrombosis …

 

Varicose veins pathology progress silently, slowly and sometimes in daily activities many people ignore that symptom. This disease can be cured, completed and the most important thing is to have preventive treatment, then comes to treatment in stages and combining multi-modal treatments.

 

Dr Tien also said that varicose veins are visible outside the skin, but deep varicose veins will not be visible because it is located deep in the body with the same vein.

 

“Symptoms of lower extremities varicose veins usually confused with lumbar spinal nerves, musculoskeletal disease of calves and thighs area. Patients with symptoms of leg edema, cramps, numbness, even a feeling of calf strain at the end of the day and in some cases of immersing feet in cold water or resting feet high and feel lighter shall visit doctor for examination, when suspecting an intravenous, doppler ultrasound will detect deep vein system reflux. With the time of reflux current over 900 ms is calculated as deep vein insufficiency”, said Dr. Tien.

 

Talking about the danger of varicose veins, Dr. Tien said, there are many patients coming to treat this disease in late stages as the disease progresses silently. Until a patient had melaleuca skin, darkened skin on lower leg, someone visit a dermatologist with foot ulcers, to discovered varicose veins.

 

In particular, the late complication of this pathology is a lot of varicose veins, stagnation in the wall of philtrum, forming a thrombus leading to venous embolism, blood cannot return, making the whole swollen, painful legs.

 

“The most dangerous is the thrombus spread to the aorta, to the heart, and lungs which lead to death. One of the many causes of sudden death is severe varicose veins. There have been cases where after 6-8 hours of sitting on the plane, someone with varicose veins suddenly die “, said Dr. Tien.

 

Wearing high heels makes it more difficult for the foot area to be motorized compared to a flat shoe. Accompanied by high heels, women often wear tight clothes, so when sitting, the entire hip and thigh area will press on the soft in the thighs, making it harder to flow the veins. Therefore, Dr. Tien recommends that women choose loose clothing, wear shoes of moderate height.

 

Women with mild varicose veins can use preventive measures to reduce progression symptoms. However, with the profession has to stand a lot, sit a lot that have symptoms of numbness, it is recommended to wear backup pressure socks to make the pressure light on the legs, usually less than 15mm of mercury to avoid dilating veins.

 

As for the teacher profession, especially female teachers, if there are signs of swelling in the legs at the end of the day or numbness, heavy leg fatigue, should take time to sit and do some tip toe exercises to strengthen vein muscular reflux. When there are symptoms of varicose veins together with symptoms of muscle swelling leg muscles, leg fatigue, and numbness then should visit doctor for advice on wearing backup pressure socks.