Venous hypertension
| Chronic venous insufficiency | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| Mild chronic venous insufficiency | |
| Classification and external resources | |
| Specialty | cardiology |
| ICD-10 | I87.2 |
| ICD-9-CM | 459.81 |
| DiseasesDB | 13734 |
| MedlinePlus | 000203 |
| eMedicine | article/461449 |
| MeSH | D014689 |
Chronic venous insufficiency (CVI) is a medical condition in which the veins cannot pump enough blood back to the heart. The most common cause of CVI is superficial venous reflux which is a treatable condition. As functional venous valves are required to provide for efficient blood return from the lower extremities, this condition typically affects the legs. If the impaired vein function causes significant symptoms, such as swelling and ulcer formation, it is referred to as chronic venous disease. CVI includes varicose veins and superficial venous reflux ("hidden varicose veins") It is sometimes called chronic peripheral venous insufficiency and should not be confused with post-thrombotic syndrome in which the deep veins have been damaged by previous deep vein thrombosis.
Most cases of CVI can be improved with treatments to the superficial venous system or stenting the deep system. Varicose veins for example can now be treated by local anesthetic endovenous surgery.
The prevalence of CVI is far higher in women than in men. The Tampere study, which examined the epidemiology of varicose veins in a large cohort of 3284 men and 3590 women, demonstrated that the prevalence of varicose veins in men and women was 18% and 42%, respectively. The condition has been known since ancient times and Hippocrates used bandaging to treat it.
Signs and symptoms of CVI in the leg include the following:
CVI in the leg may cause the following:
CVI in the leg may be caused by the following:
Surgical treatment of CVI attempts a cure by physically changing the veins with incompetent valves. Surgical treatments for CVI include the following:
Treatment of CVI in the leg involves managing the symptoms (and preventing the symptoms getting worse) instead of effecting a cure. It is sometimes called conservative treatment. Conservative treatments include:
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