4 Myths about veins

Women get varicose veins more often than men

This myth is one of the most often repeated myths - that is also wrong - except in the condition of Vulval or Vaginal Varicose Veins It used to be thought to be true when most research was done by simple methods. In the case of finding out who gets varicose veins, GP's or surgeons used to count numbers of patients who turns up to see them complaining of varicose veins. However, whereas women are generally good about seeking health care, men are not. Men tend to avoid going to doctors at all costs - often to their own detriment. As such, it appeared that women had varicose veins more than men - solely because more women consulted doctors about varicose veins than men. As such, when a researcher from Edinburgh went out into the community and examined people at random, she found that slightly more men than women have varicose veins. This was presented in 1998 and is a good test to see whether your source of information is up to date.

Pregnancy causes Varicose Veins

Pregnancy has been blamed for causing varicose veins for years. This has been due to the simple observation that some women don't seem to have varicose veins before they get pregnant - but then the veins appear during or after their pregnancy. However there are two very good reasons why this is "old hat":

If pregnancy caused varicose veins, then more women would have varicose veins than men - but this is not what is found.
Research done in Chester has shown that only women who have lost their valves before getting pregnant go on to get varicose veins in pregnancy. In other words, pregnancy does not cause varicose veins, but if you have the underlying valve problem, they may become more visible during pregnancy. However, they would have come anyway sooner or later.

This is true for 98% of all women - however - there is a special group of patients who do get varicose veins because of pregnancy. These are called "ovarian" or "pelvic" vein reflux and typically cause vulval varicose veins or varicose veins of the upper inner thigh or spreading over the backs of the legs at the top of the thigh.

You should wait until you've had your family before getting your veins fixed

This is advice given by most doctors and nurses still today - despite it being completely wrong as well as illogical and against the current research.As seen before on the page about the myth that pregnancy causes varicose veins - pregnancy does not cause varicose veins, but does make them worse.

Therefore the sooner the veins are fixed: