VARICOSE VEINS.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XLIX, Issue 3840, 4 September 1928, Page 4

VARICOSE VEINS.

REMOVAL BY INJECTION. IMPORTANT DISCOVERY. NO LYING-UP NECESSARY. A recent achievement of medical science is the removal of varicose veins and related conditions by a simple process of injections. The system is now commonly practised with great success, and with so little discomfiture to the patients that it is not necessary for them to lie up. Thus the discovery has important economic advantages.

Formerly these swollen veins could be removed only by surgical means, in which case the patient had to remain in hospital for several weeks, and usually was unfit for duty for at least six weeks. Now the most severe conditions are dealt with by a small hypodermic needle the effects of which are little more than stiffness the following day. Certain solutions, including solutions of quinine, are used. When injected into the affected veins they set up chemical irritation of the walls which leads, in the course of a few days, to their obliteration. These solutions have been proved by thousands of eases to be sure and safe in their action.

Varicose veins often cause quite a serious degree of disablement, in which event a surgical operation formerly was compulsory. Often they are only a cause of disfigurement which to women, in these days of short-skirted fashions, is serious enough. But before the new method, the only alternative was an operation, with the likelihood of scars. Now there is the way of escape without that penalty.

The fact that patients are no longer admitted to hospital for the treatment of varicose veins represents an important saving of hospital space, and, of course, a saving of time and money to the individual. Probably the discovery will do much to reduce the number of those who, from varicose veins, develop chronic leg ulcers, the treatment of which throws another burden on hospitals. With simple injection treatment available specialist knowledge is not required—much of this trouble ought to be obviated. Similar treatment in modified form is given for piles, another trouble which weighs heavily on the individual, and, when dealt with surgically, taxes hospital space. For varicose veins alone, the new process is a great boon to humanity. It is definitely proved, and in Auckland some very severe forms of the condition have been successfully cured without the patients going to bed, although a series of treatments may have been necessary.