Use Exercise to Stave Off Leg Troubles

legs

Building strong legs is not something in the forefront of most people’s minds, with many instead focusing on wanting to be thinner or have six-pack abs. But making sure your legs are healthy is a big factor in overall health, and if you don’t take care of your muscles and veins, you can end up with problems later down the line, such as varicose or thread veins, blood clots, or lower leg injuries.


Varicose Veins, Clots and Injuries

Without taking care of your legs, a number of issues can arise which may at first appear superficial, but can become significant health problems if left untreated. For example, varicose veins and thread veins can begin to form in the veins in your lower legs, if the small valves inside the veins begin to fail. When the valves stop working effectively, they stop being able to help push the blood in your legs back towards the heart, and the vein can twist and bulge, becoming painful.

The pooling blood can also begin to seep into the surrounding tissue around the bulging vein, causing varicose eczema, swelling, and skin discolouration. This pooling blood can also turn into something more serious: a blood clot or deep vein thrombosis. This can result in a heart attack or stroke.

Furthermore, if you don’t take care of your legs with exercise and muscle-strengthening exercises, your legs can generally become weaker. Exercises that involve jumping and stepping contribute to the strength of your bones, and if you don’t get regular exercise you can end up with bones that are more susceptible to injuries.

Exercises for Healthy Legs

There are a number of exercises that you can do to support your leg health, preventing bone injuries and venous issues. First, do exercises that are good generally for your cardiovascular health, such as jogging, swimming, and cycling. Also ensure that you do exercises that focus on your leg muscles, and stretch your calf muscles, quadriceps, and hamstrings.

Yoga can also be a useful, low-impact exercise for your muscles and circulation, and it can also help the joints and tendons in your ankles and pelvis to be more flexible. This can help to make other exercises easier, and build your overall fitness to encourage greater general health.

By getting your circulation flowing, you will help to keep your blood thinner, which can take pressure off the valves in your leg veins, and prevent blood from pooling. You can also prevent bone strength or tendon flexibility issues by working strengthening and flexibility exercises into your routine.

Treatment for Leg Problems

If you already developed varicose or thread veins, talk to your care provider about treatment options. While they may look like a cosmetic problem, they can become serious. Varicose and thread vein removal procedures are typically minimally-invasive outpatient surgeries. This means that the entire surgery will be completed within a few hours, and you’ll be able to go back home right after the surgery without having to wait in the clinic.

Most treatments come under two categories: chemical treatments, and heat treatments. Heat treatments use, for example, lasers to seal off and remove the vein, while chemical treatments inject a chemical such as in foam sclerotherapy to seal the vein.

Getting regular exercise that focuses on the lower leg, and taking steps to prevent varicose and thread veins, as well as blood clots or leg injuries, can stand you in good stead for overall health later on. If despite your best efforts, problems develop, you can have confidence that available treatments will get you back on your feet in no time.

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