Protruding veins: causes and treatment methods

Protruding veins on the arms in most cases are only an aesthetic problem. As a rule, they are noticeable on the hands (especially on the middle, ring and index fingers), wrists and forearms, sometimes on the shoulders, and this phenomenon is observed more often in men than in women.

But the absence of physical discomfort does not always indicate the norm of such a symptom. If the veins in your arms protrude, this happens often, they are very visible, and even more so if they hurt, ache or pull, you should consult a doctor to find out exactly the reasons for what is happening.

Why does this happen?

It is important to be able to distinguish in which case this symptom is a variant of the norm, a physiological condition, and in which it is pathological, requiring diagnosis and treatment.

This is what it looks like in the photo:

In ordinary healthy people

As a normal option, large swollen veins in the arms may appear in the following situations:

1. A person regularly performs strength physical activity on his hands. In this case, the pressure on the vessels increases, expanding their lumen, and at the same time, the arm muscles become hard - they also help push the veins out.
2. From the blow. The site of the bruise usually swells, the vessel becomes more noticeable and pronounced. If a person hits his hand right in the place where the vein passes, then it may swell, turn blue or purple, sometimes even turn black and a bruise will form around it.
3. Thin, translucent skin (especially in girls, teenage boys and children), with a small layer of subcutaneous fat that could hide blood vessels. Normally, this problem should not cause cosmetic defects in a child.
4. A hereditary feature is the superficial location of the veins. Most often, enlarged veins appear after too much physical exertion or when a person holds for a long time and then quickly lowers his hands. It occurs less frequently in boys than in girls.
5. Hot weather, significant increase in air temperature. This factor sometimes provokes increased blood pumping in the extremities, due to which the vessels and capillaries increase in size, inflate and become convex (on the legs this manifests itself as varicose veins and swelling in the evenings).
6. In older people, as a result of the aging of the body. With age, the elasticity of blood vessels begins to be lost, the walls of the veins are unable to maintain their shape, and the tortuous pattern on the hands becomes more noticeable.
7. Pregnancy, postpartum period. In this condition, bulging veins in women is a physiological process associated with hormonal changes in the body.
8. Blood collection, IV placement, anesthesia administration. In some people, the veins may swell after a blood donation procedure, or after a catheter is removed. In this case, the injection site often ache, itch, and there is redness and burning. This is an absolutely normal phenomenon that is associated with anatomy, there is no need to worry. But if there is also pain, you should consult a doctor, this may be a sign of post-injection phlebitis.
9. When you lower your hands. A similar phenomenon is usually observed in people with problems with blood pressure, with increased blood density. When the arms are lowered, especially if they had been raised for a long time before or were under tension, the blood does not have time to circulate normally and the veins become more visible.

If the veins swell and then disappear, this may indicate a temporary circulatory disorder. In this situation, there is no point in trying to reduce them; they must hide on their own.

In athletes

In people who are actively involved in sports, veins appear much more often than in others. For example, in bodybuilders and bodybuilders, increased venousness and pulsation is due to the fact that during training the athlete’s arms bear a huge load - the vessels from the inside bulge from the muscles, which grow rapidly.

Another option is if the vessels of the upper or lower extremities swell immediately after training. This happens because physical activity increased blood flow and expanded the lumen of the vessels, which then come to the surface.

Due to illness

Pathological reasons for swollen veins in the arms are less common than physiological ones, but they should not be ignored. It is important to exclude in time a possible disease that will cause not only aesthetic inconvenience, but also possible serious complications in the future.

Most often, diseases that provoke such a symptom are:

1. Varicose veins. It occurs when the walls of blood vessels weaken, causing congestion to clog them, causing them to swell and bulge under the skin.
2. Thrombosis. With this disease, blockages (one or more) appear in the deep veins, which form a blood clot. The pathology is quite difficult to identify in the early stages, while the superficial vessels have not yet emerged; it is practically not accompanied by symptoms. From time to time a person may feel heaviness in the limbs and pain when palpated.
3. Thrombophlebitis. This is an inflammatory process of the walls of superficial blood vessels. They become dark blue, in advanced cases they turn black and are very painful.
4. Postphlebitic syndrome. A pathology characterized by a complication of deep vessel thrombosis.

Pregnancy

The circulatory system of a pregnant woman works with double load: it must provide oxygen not only to the expectant mother, but also to the growing fetus. As it develops, the blood flow becomes more intense, the woman’s veins expand and appear under the skin. They are especially noticeable on the limbs, neck, and growing abdomen.

The slightest load contributes to additional expansion of the veins. What happens next depends on genetic characteristics: if the walls of the vessels are dense and the body receives enough oxygen, the veins narrow slightly at rest.

Compression stockings and special bandages will help reduce the load. After childbirth, the state of the circulatory system stabilizes; if this does not happen, a phlebologist is needed.

Associated symptoms

In the case of pathological provoking factors, pronounced veins usually cause not only aesthetic, but also physical discomfort.

This mainly manifests itself:

• heaviness and pain in the hands;
• swelling of the hands.

One of the common symptoms is a constant desire to fix the arms above the level of the head (in this position, the outflow of stagnant blood improves).

In difficult cases, when vein pathology is caused by serious circulatory disorders, as well as thrombophlebitis, the following is observed:

• slight increase in body temperature;
• hyperemia of the skin of the hands;
• lump, lump, lump, swelling or ball at the site of the lesion;
• swelling, blueness;
• change in skin color;
• muscle weakness;
• the appearance of ulcers on the skin.

Treatment tactics

Treatment of any pathology depends on the cause that provoked it. Therapeutic measures for pronounced veins can be medicinal and surgical.

The last option is resorted to in two cases: either if the disease progresses and there is a risk of a large blood clot, or if the patient simply wants to eliminate an aesthetic defect.

General recommendations

To enhance the effect of drug or surgical therapy, you need to help the body remove (hide) visible veins.

For this:

• Drink enough clean, non-carbonated water. This will improve the structure of the skin of your hands, it will become smoother and more elastic.
• Avoid coffee and alcohol. This will make the skin color uniform, without a “gray” tint.
• Use hand creams. This can be either a simple moisturizer or a special anti-varicose cream. The latter will improve the tone of blood vessels, and, if the problem has not gone far, will hide them.

Hand exercises

There is a whole list of exercises (pictured below) that will help eliminate large veins.

Here are the most effective:

1. Clasp your hands into fists, lower and raise them “all the way”, bending your hands – 10 times.
2. Alternately extend your fingers to the back, then together.
3. Gather the fingers of the right and left hands into a bun, lower them together downwards, bending the hand, return to the starting position - 10 times.
4. Work your thumbs: pull them back and forth and to the sides.
5. Clenching your hands into fists, twist them, bending your wrist.
6. Forcefully bend and straighten your fingers into fists – 10 times.
7. Place your palms together in front of your chest, bend your arms at the elbow joints, raise your elbows up, lowering your hands to your navel.
8. Walk along any surface with your fingers, imitating playing the piano.
9. Straighten your arms, point them in different directions, swing them in a circle - forward and backward.
10. In the same position, bend your elbows and make circular movements of your limbs, first to the right, then to the left.

Such exercises, performed daily, can really improve the aesthetic appearance of the hands by restoring the tone of the blood vessels.

Drug therapy

Conservative treatment is aimed not only at eliminating the visible defect, but also at stopping the cause that caused it.

Basically, doctors prescribe:

Alternative Therapies

If the veins become very enlarged and protrude, but there are no blood clots or a threat to health, alternative medicine can come to the rescue. This is a whole set of folk recipes, treatment with leeches, acupuncture.

Important: before deciding on unconventional methods of treatment, you need to consult a doctor and make sure that the chosen method will not harm or aggravate the situation. Poor patient tests will be the first contraindication for the use of alternative medicine methods.

Reviews from doctors about alternative medicine are mixed, but all experts agree that they can only be used when there are no blood clots or visible varicose veins.

Folk recipes

We bring to your attention popular recipes for folk remedies that can help with swollen veins in the hands:

• Take a green tomato (according to the degree of ripeness), cut it into slices, place it on your hand in the place where the veins emerge and swell, and wrap it with an elastic bandage overnight. In the morning, remove everything and spread the skin with a high-fat cream.
• Mix crushed wormwood (3 tablespoons) with the same amount of curdled milk, smear the resulting medicine on your hand and wrap it in cling film. After 20 minutes, remove the compress and spread the skin with rich cream or sour cream. This will take up to a month.
• Apple cider vinegar and birch bud tincture are mixed 1:1, rub your hands with the resulting mixture twice a day.
• Chopped garlic and butter in equal proportions are mixed and applied to the hands in places where the veins are swollen. The compress needs to be insulated as much as possible (using cling film and a towel on top). You will have to smear visible veins for up to 5 months.
• Drink herbal tea: rose hips, blueberry leaves, rowan berries and St. John's wort are mixed in equal parts. Take half a glass twice a day, brewing a tablespoon of the resulting tea with boiling water.

Hirudotherapy

Treatment with leeches is practiced even with pronounced veins, when the hands swell from insufficient blood outflow.

The essence of hirudotherapy is that a specially grown medical leech is placed on a patient at a certain point on the body. During the bite, a substance, hirudin, enters the blood, which thins it and prevents blood clots.

Patients note an improvement in the appearance of their hands and overall well-being after the first session. After manipulation, the leech is placed in medical alcohol.

Acupuncture

Using this method, certain points of the human body are affected by introducing special thin needles into them. They activate biological processes in the body, thereby restoring normal blood flow and preventing congestion.

This method is not recommended for everyone, as it has a number of contraindications. Before deciding to go to an acupuncture session, you need to take all the tests and notify your doctor.

How to remove bulging veins on the arms?

The best way to remove veins on the arms that are very visible is to prevent them from appearing. Therefore, starting from the age of 30, it is important not only to systematically care for your hands, not forgetting about their hydration and nutrition, but also to perform simple preventive measures.

These exercises should help remove small veins that have already appeared on the arms without resorting to surgery.

Set of exercises

So, the set of exercises is aimed primarily at preventing deep folds from appearing on the arms, which can tighten the vein. To do this, you need to very often perform any exercises (do finger exercises) that will stretch the space between the fingers. The great thing is that you can do these exercises anywhere - on public transport, in queues, just walking down the street, etc.

• Swing all phalanges of your fingers. Something like how we do “Magpie-Crow” for little children.
• Bend and swing all the creases in your arms and hands.
• Spread your fingers out to the sides.
• Walk your fingers along the surface of the table.
• It is also necessary to perform exercises with raised arms daily to improve blood circulation.

That is, try to do all the exercises that will force your fingers and hands to move to prevent the formation of deep folds and folds.

Sometimes, when performing these exercises, pain may occur, but then the pain recedes into the background and the condition of the hands improves - they become smooth, and the veins on the hands are not so visible.

Hand massage

Don't forget about hand massage. Massaging your hands will help remove muscle creases and remove folds on your hands - you will make room for the formation of subcutaneous tissue. Work with your hands a little every day.