What Is a Varicose Vein?
Your heart pumps blood throughout your body in long, muscular pipes called blood vessels. The pipes that transport the fresh, oxygen-rich blood (and the nutrients it carries) to your vital organs and tissues are called arteries. The tubes that return the blood back to your heart are called veins. In medium-sized veins, a series of valves keeps the blood flowing in the right direction. Sometimes the valves fail or the muscle walls weaken, and instead of flowing forward, tiny amounts of blood pool inside the veins. When this happens, the vein bulges and twists, eventually emerging as a varicose vein . If the varicose vein is near the surface of your skin, it will appear enlarged, lumpy, and dark blue. Another, less extreme type of varicose vein is a “spider vein.” These thin red or purplish networks of very fine veins near the surface of the skin take their name from the pattern they form, often resembling a tangle of spiders. No one knows what causes them.”They run in families and often
