Varicose Veins

• Family background – if a parent or sibling has ropey veins, your own risk nearly doubles.
• Hours on your feet (or seat) – nurses, teachers, security guards and office workers spend whole shifts fighting gravity or sitting motionless, slowing calf-pump flow.
• Hormonal surges and pregnancy – rising progesterone relaxes vessel walls, and nine months of extra blood volume stretches them further.
• Ageing – with time, the collagen scaffold inside the vein thins and valves lose their spring.
• Weight & inactivity – added abdominal pressure plus a weak calf muscle pump accentuates blood pool.
• Potential triggers/accelerators– smoking, a past deep-vein thrombosis, or long-term oestrogen therapy can all hasten the leakiness.

Knowing which factors apply to you helps Dr. Lim tailor both prevention (compression, exercise, weight control) and any treatment that follows.