How to make your hands look younger – Dubai, United Arab Emirates
Before (left-side), After (right-side)
Bulging, protruding veins on the hands are a source of embarrassment to many women who often complain that these ropy and pronounced veins make them look older than they really are. Other are simply embarrassed by them. “I have spent my life hiding my hands”, “Trying to pay quickly at cashiers and never playing cards or board games”, “ I always put my hands up by bending my elbows when I am at gatherings so my veins empty” are few excerpts of emails we receive from patients struggling with their ropy, pronounced unwanted hand veins.
These superficial non-essential hand veins are a normal presence in all human beings and in most of us they are not visible nor do they protrude or bulge. However, in some people, they become visible, enlarged and are unsightly. This happens when the fat layer surrounding these veins melts or the overlying skin becomes thin and loses collagen or a combination of these two factors. Excessive weight loss, overuse of our hands and upper body weight lifting contribute to loss of the fat layer around the veins, while aging, overexposure to the sun and other factors (genetic and environmental) cause thinking of the skin.
Bulging, protruding, enlarged visible hand veins are rarely of medical concern nor do they cause symptoms. However, these unwanted hand veins are unsightly to many women and make women look old than they really are. The saying that you can tell a person’s age, irrespective of all cosmetic procedures he or she may have, from their hands and neck is very true.
The safest and most effective treatment for removing these unwanted hand vein is either by Laser Ablation endovenously, a procedure that was introduced by Dr. Asad R Shamma, MD, FACS in 2001 and published in the Journal of Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18090768) or by sclerotherapy. Both procedures are minimally invasive.
With LASER ablation, a tiny LASER fiber is introduced into the unwanted vein and LASER energy is applied to the inner lining of the unwanted vein as the fiber is withdrawn thus sealing the vein. In sclerotherapy, the vein is sealed by injecting a sclerosing agent inside the underside vein. Based on the number of unwanted veins you have, their size, length, and degree of tortuosity, your doctor can advise you which procedure is best suited for you. There is no downtime with either procedure and you can resume your normal activities immediately. Both result in permanent results and the veins never reappear.
Some advocate the use of fillers to hide these unwanted hands. Fillers can be chemical substances infected subcutaneously (example Radiesse ®, and Hyaluronic Acid) or what is called fat transfer where your doctor aspirates a small amount of fat from one of the areas of your body and injects it under the skin. Dr. Asad R. Shamma, a world authority on the treatment of unwanted hand veins does not condone the filler technique. He cites the following reasons for not favoring the filler technique.
- The hands bulge unsightly as a result of injecting the filler and oftentimes the result is not symmetrical (one hand looks bigger than the other)
- The results are not permanent and re-treatment is needed as soon as 12 months.
- Most importantly, it is almost impossible to effectively hide the veins with fillers because the superficial hand veins are adherent to the deeper layer of the skin and it is difficult to safely inject the filler in the almost nonexistent plane between the skin and the vein.
For these reasons Dr. Shamma exclusively uses Sclerotherapy or LASER ablation to treat unwanted bulging veins of the hands. In Dr. Shamma’s hands, and with the use of trans illumination to guide his treatment of unwanted hand veins and by supplementing the sclerotherapy with injection of tumescent solution to compress and empty the vein while the sclerosing agent is doing its job in sealing the unwanted veins, sclerotherapy is now his preferred method in most cases. Exceptions are when long veins extending into the forearm need to be treated. In these cases, the LASER technique is more applicable.
Removing/sealing the bulging protruding hand veins is not advisable in patients with chronic disease who require frequent hospitalizations and have a disease that requires frequent blood drawing or intravenous treatment. In all other patients, it is safe effective and has no long-term effects. Our blood can easily and seamlessly flow back through the tens of deeper veins that we have in our hand and there are no sequelae or side effects from removing the superficial bulging veins.
Before (left-side), After (right-side)
For more information and details about the treatment, you can watch: Treatment of Hand Veins in Dubai, United Arab Emirates
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+971 4 349 8800
Dubai, United Arab Emirates