What is the difference between vein stripping and laser treatment?
For more than a hundred years, surgeons have been treating varicose veins by removing or stripping the main trunks of the superficial veins called saphenous veins. This requires general anesthesia in a hospital and several large incisions. Recovery is much longer and large, unsightly surgical scars are inevitable. With today’s technological advances, it is not necessary to perform the so-called “stripping and ligation” of the varicose veins. We can simply close the saphenous vein from inside by use of laser energy. This is called Endovenous Laser Therapy and is performed under local anesthesia as an out-patient procedure and may not require a single incision.
