Wound Care
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The dressing on your wound is best left-undisturbed for 48hours to allow the wound to seal.
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After 3 days when you take the stocking off and have abath you have the choice of keeping the wound dry andleaving the dressing on.
OR
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You can submerge the wound and remove the wetdressing.
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The wound does not need to be re-covered but is liable torub on clothes or stockings and most people prefer to re-cover it with a dressing of their own.
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Some surgeons use dissolvable stitches, others preferones which have to be removed and you need to make anappointment for this with the Nurse at you GP Surgery(usually about one week later).
Pain
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After the operation the wound will be uncomfortable butsevere pain is seldom a problem with varicose veinsurgery.
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When you return home Paracetamol or some other mildpainkiller which you are used to taking is usually all that isneeded.
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The wound will be tender for a week or two but shouldsteadily improve.
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Increasing pain may indicate an infection or phlebitis andyou should consult your GP.
An explanation about veins
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Arteries carry blood into the legs .
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Veins return the blood from the legs to the heart.
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Some of the veins are deep within the muscles whichsupport and massage them during walking.
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Other veins are nearer the surface, in the layer of fatunder the skin. These veins have little support and if theybecome dilated are called “varicose veins”.
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Normally one-way valves within the veins help to keep theblood flowing back to the heart even against gravity.
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A major cause of varicose veins is a failure of one ofthese valves.
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The common large valves to fail are the ones in the groinand behind the knee. The back pressure this causes,results in varicose veins further down the leg.
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If there is a major failure of an important valve, justinjecting the veins is seldom successful without first tyingoff the vein with the faulty valve. This is similar to puttingup a diversion sign on a motorway which is blocked.Other routes take over and the return of the blood fromthe legs is improved
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Sometimes the dilated veins improve so much when thebackflow is stopped that no further treatment is needed.
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The 6 weeks between operation and re-assessment givesopportunity for this to happen
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