Remedies To Reduce Varicose Veins (Or Avoid Them Entirely)
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It’s Q&A Day at 10almonds!
Have a question or a request? We love to hear from you!
In cases where we’ve already covered something, we might link to what we wrote before, but will always be happy to revisit any of our topics again in the future too—there’s always more to say!
As ever: if the question/request can be answered briefly, we’ll do it here in our Q&A Thursday edition. If not, we’ll make a main feature of it shortly afterwards!
So, no question/request too big or small 😎
❝what to do about varicose veins, anything other than com,pression socks?❞
So, first of all, we did do an article a while back that has some overlap:
DVT Risk Management Beyond The Socks
Now, it’s worth noting that deep vein thrombosis (DVT) and varicose veins do have some important dissimilarities:
- DVT is, as the full name suggests, about thrombotic risk, i.e. blood clots
- Varicose veins are, as the name suggests (Latin varix = dilated) about dilated veins, i.e. more like the opposite problem
…which means that while circulation is an important factor in both, some medications/supplements/strategies will only be appropriate for one or the other.
Also,
- DVT, being about thrombotic risk, can kill you
- Varicose veins are usually considered harmless in and of themselves (although they sometimes may be a symptom of something else, and the something else can sometimes be more serious, sometimes not, so it’s still worth getting checked out).
Lastly, before we carry on, let’s note that varicose veins are not the same thing as “thread veins” or “spider veins”:
- Thread/Spider veins are usually small veins or even capillaries near the skin, and can be blue or red depending on oxygenation (including: depending on direction of travel), often appearing purple if moderately oxygenated or the red/blue are plumbed next to each other and you are effectively viewing both at once. They do not caused raised textures, and are merely visible.
- Varicose veins are, by definition, larger swollen veins (dilating made them larger, and the pressure of blood swells them) that have lost tension, thus often appear twisted, and because of their size, are very often palpable (producing raised textures that can be felt easily with the hand).
Now, onto the topic of management…
What can be done?
Firstly: if they are not causing you discomfort, and a doctor has confirmed to your satisfaction that they’re not a symptom of something more serious, you can just ignore them.
However, it’s probably best to try to treat them regardless, as something ignored now could potentially cause problems later, and it’d be nicer to avoid that later discomfort by treating them now.
Home remedies are plentiful and many are effective:
- Compression stockings: these effectively replace the tension that the veins were supposed to have—but it’s worth noting that this means they treat the symptom, not the cause. See also:
- Loose clothing: paradoxically, can help too. The thing here is that certain tight clothing—like “shapewear” designed to give a conventionally attractive outline between one’s waist and thighs—can essentially be similar to having applied a tourniquet in several places, which thus can cause circulatory problems, and is not the same same thing as compression stockings’ much more evenly-applied pressure. See also:
- Put your feet up: literally, elevating your feet makes the circulation’s job easier. Of course, this is a temporary relief, as for most people it will be impractical to spend all hours with one’s feet elevated. A good use of this one is to compensate for extended periods of standing, during which time (if circulation is not excellent) blood can pool somewhat from the bottom up, contributing to varicose veins. See also:
- Keep moving: paradoxically again, can help too. Cardio exercise is great for the circulation, as is movement in general (even without breaking a sweat). Again, this is important for breaking up periods of standing or sitting. See also:
- Diet: especially, enjoy lots of fruit and vegetables. Fiber, especially rutin, is important for circulatory health, as are polyphenols, especially flavonoids. See also:
- Electrolyte balance: to help the body’s natural process of homeostasis (by which, amongst many other things, it maintains blood pressure), many people would benefit from consuming less sodium (increases water retention and blood pressure) and more potassium (reduces water retention and blood pressure). See also:
- Lose weight if you can healthily do so: simply, more weight puts more pressure on the circulatory system, so losing weight can alleviate that. However, being underweight is not beneficial either, nor are overly restrictive diets, so please do be moderate in any use of this one. See also:
There are also herbal remedies, but we were not able to find any reliable evidence to support them, aside from insofar as many plants (and thus, their phytochemicals) do support good circulation, as we covered above under “diet”.
Failing all that, doctors have an array of surgical options at their disposal, mostly various methods of sealing and sometimes removing the veins in question. None seem pleasant and all surgeries carry at least some risk, but that’s a discussion for you and your doctor.
Take care!
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The Microbeads That Fight Fat
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…and other items from this week’s health news:
Move over, microplastics
Researchers (Dr. Yue Wu et al.) have developed edible microbeads made from green tea polyphenols, vitamin E and seaweed that form chemical bonds with fat droplets, are protected from stomach acid by the seaweed coating, then expand and bind fats in the gut, so that they can then be excreted without being absorbed—much like resistant starches do with cholesterol.
Dr. Wu and her team say the beads are nearly flavorless, can be made into small boba-like balls for drinks and desserts, and have no known side effects. All ingredients are FDA-approved, food-grade, and production can be scaled up easily.
The earliest clinical trials were with rats, and now a human clinical trial is underway:
Read in full: Edible microbeads trap fat to support weight loss
Related: The Food Additive You Do Want
You know what’s really ironic?
Hemoglobin!
You probably know that hemoglobin carries oxygen in red blood cells, but it’s also found in astrocytes (brain helper cells) where it acts as an antioxidant by breaking down hydrogen peroxide (which yes, is present in the brain).
This is big news, because most antioxidant drugs that have been trialled for this, failed because they couldn’t cross the blood–brain barrier, were unstable, and/or harmed healthy cells. In contrast, astrocytic hemoglobin works like a “pseudoperoxidase,” neutralizing H₂O₂ into harmless water, protecting neurons from oxidative damage.
You may be thinking: that’s great, but what can we do about it? The researchers created a small water-soluble molecule (with the snappy name: KDS12025) that crosses the blood–brain barrier, binds to hemoglobin, and boosts its H₂O₂-degrading ability nearly 100-fold without affecting oxygen transport:
Read in full: Hemoglobin emerges as a natural antioxidant defense in the brain
Related: Avoiding Anemia (More Than Just “Get More Iron”)
Low water, high stress
Hydration is important, but what a lot of people don’t know is that adults who drink less than 1.5 liters of water daily show over 50% higher cortisol response to stress compared with those meeting water intake recommendations.
Which is a lot!
Why this happens: dehydration triggers vasopressin release, which conserves water via the kidneys but also stimulates cortisol release in the brain’s stress center.
In particular, the researchers recommend that staying hydrated before stressful events, for which they give the examples of deadlines or public speaking, can help your body manage stress more effectively. Just, maybe visit the bathroom before you go on stage!
Read in full: Low daily fluid intake linked to higher stress hormone response in adults
Related: 8 Signs Of High Cortisol & How To Reverse “Cortisol Face”
Take care!
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6 Blood Markers That Predict Disease Years Before Symptoms Appear
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Do you have these 6 done?
When “normal” isn’t helpful
Most of the most common blood tests are designed to confirm established disease, not detect the slow, early biological drift that occurs years before symptoms appear.
Here are 6 that do better:
- High-sensitivity CRP: persistently elevated hs-CRP within the “normal” range reflects chronic low-grade inflammation that predicts cardiovascular disease, stroke, diabetes, cancer, and dementia long before diagnosis.
- Fasting insulin: elevated fasting insulin with normal glucose reveals early insulin resistance, a reversible stage that predicts type 2 diabetes, cardiovascular disease, and often even Alzheimer’s disease years in advance.
- ApoB: apolipoprotein B directly counts atherogenic particles and predicts heart attack and stroke risk more accurately than LDL cholesterol, especially in people with metabolic dysfunction.
- Homocysteine: raised homocysteine damages blood vessels and brain tissue, increasing risks of cardiovascular disease and dementia, and is often correctable with adequate B-vitamin status.
- HbA1c trajectory: trends and position within the normal range matter more than cut-offs, with gradual rises over years signalling worsening metabolic health and cumulative glycation damage.
- GlycA: this little-known marker reflects long-term inflammatory burden and predicts cardiovascular disease, diabetes, and mortality more strongly than many traditional tests.
Lastly, Dr. Wibberly advises us that patterns that can be noted from repeated measurements over time reveal true risk, whereas isolated “normal” results can hide a worsening biological trajectory.
For more on all of this, enjoy:
Click Here If The Embedded Video Doesn’t Load Automatically!
Want to learn more?
You might also like:
Early Dementia Screening From Your Blood & More
And for a much more comprehensive overview of blood tests in general:
Common Sense Labs: Blood Labs Demystified – by Dr. Ken Berry & Kim Howerton
Take care!
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An Elegant Defense – by Matt Richtel
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In a way, Richtel got the best and worst of the publication date lottery. This book, which he’d obviously been working on for however long, was published in March 2020. Yes, that March 2020. So, it obviously got a huge boost in sales that launced it to bestseller status, and/but it doesn’t actually discuss COVID at all.
What it does discuss, is—as one might expect—the immune system. Or really, the immune systems, plural, several systems working alongside each other. How we got to have such, how our immune functions work, where all the various immune cells come from and what part they play. What pathogens can do to fight and/or confuse (or even co-opt) our immune response, and what modern medicine can do to counteract the pathogens’ anti-countermeasure countermeasures. And how it can still go wrong.
The “Four Lives” promised in the subtitle are stories, and Richtel explains the immune system through specific people’s specific battles. In particular, a friend of his who had quite a remarkable battle against cancer, which was of course terrible for him, but illustrative for us.
The style of the book is very readably journalistic. The author is a Pulitzer-winning NYT journalist, and not normally a science writer. Here at 10almonds, “we like big bibliographies and we cannot lie”, and we didn’t get to enjoy that in this case. The book contained no bibliography (nor appropriate inline citations, nor equivalent footnotes). Maybe a future addition will include this.
Bottom line: there’s a lot of “science for the lay reader” here. While the lack of references is a big oversight, the book does give a very good overview of what both sides (immune response and pathogenic invasion) bring to the battle of your body.
Click here to check out Elegant Defense, and demystify immunology!
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Topping Up Testosterone?
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The Testosterone Drop
Testosterone levels decline amongst men over a certain age. Exactly when depends on the individual and also how we measure it, but the age of 45 is a commonly-given waypoint for the start of this decline.
(the actual start is usually more like 20, but it’s a very small decline then, and speeds up a couple of decades later)
This has been called “the male menopause”, or “the andropause”.
Both terms are a little misleading, but for lack of a better term, “andropause” is perhaps not terrible.
Why “the male menopause” is misleading:
To call it “the male menopause” suggests that this is when men’s menstruation stops. Which for cis men at the very least, is simply not a thing they ever had in the first place, to stop (and for trans men it’s complicated, depending on age, hormones, surgeries, etc).
Why “the andropause” is misleading:
It’s not a pause, and unlike the menopause, it’s not even a stop. It’s just a decline. It’s more of an andro-pitter-patter-puttering-petering-out.
Is there a better clinical term?
Objectively, there is “late-onset hypogonadism” but that is unlikely to be taken up for cultural reasons—people stigmatize what they see as a loss of virility.
Terms aside, what are the symptoms?
❝Andropause or late-onset hypogonadism is a common disorder which increases in prevalence with advancing age. Diagnosis of late-onset of hypogonadism is based on presence of symptoms suggestive of testosterone deficiency – prominent among them are sexual symptoms like…❞
…and there we’d like to continue the quotation, but if we list the symptoms here, it won’t get past a lot of filters because of the words used. So instead, please feel free to click through:
Source: Andropause: Current concepts
Can it be safely ignored?
If you don’t mind the sexual symptoms, then mostly, yes!
However, there are a few symptoms we can mention here that are not so subjective in their potential for harm:
- Depression
- Loss of muscle mass
- Increased body fat
Depression kills, so this does need to be taken seriously. See also:
The Mental Health First-Aid That You’ll Hopefully Never Need
(the above is a guide to managing depression, in yourself or a loved one)
Loss of muscle mass means being less robust against knocks and falls later in life
Loss of muscle mass also means weaker bones (because the body won’t make bones stronger than it thinks they need to be, so bone will follow muscle in this regard—in either direction)
See also:
- Resistance Is Useful! (Especially As We Get Older)
- Protein vs Sarcopenia
- Fall Special (How to Proof Yourself Against Falls)
Increased body fat means increased risk of diabetes and heart disease, as a general rule of thumb, amongst other problems.
Will testosterone therapy help?
That’s something to discuss with your endocrinologist, but for most men whose testosterone levels are lower than is ideal for them, then yes, taking testosterone to bring them [back] to “normal” levels can make you happier and healthier (though it’s certainly not a cure-all).
See for example:
Testosterone Therapy Improves […] and […] in Hypogonadal Men
(Sorry, we’re not trying to be clickbaity, there are just some words we can’t use without encountering software problems)
Here’s a more comprehensive study that looked at 790 men aged 65 or older, with testosterone levels below a certain level. It looked at the things we can’t mention here, as well as physical function and general vitality:
❝The increase in testosterone levels was associated with significantly increased […] activity, as assessed by the Psychosexual Daily Questionnaire (P<0.001), as well as significantly increased […] desire and […] function.
The percentage of men who had an increase of at least 50 m in the 6-minute walking distance did not differ significantly between the two study groups in the Physical Function Trial but did differ significantly when men in all three trials were included (20.5% of men who received testosterone vs. 12.6% of men who received placebo, P=0.003).
Testosterone had no significant benefit with respect to vitality, as assessed by the Functional Assessment of Chronic Illness Therapy–Fatigue scale, but men who received testosterone reported slightly better mood and lower severity of depressive symptoms than those who received placebo❞
Source: Effects of Testosterone Treatment in Older Men
We strongly recommend, by the way, when a topic is of interest to you to read the paper itself, because even the extract above contains some subjectivity, for example what is “slightly better”, and what is “no significant benefit”.
That “slightly better mood and lower severity of depressive symptoms”, for example, has a P value of 0.004 in their data, which is an order of magnitude more significant than the usual baseline for significance (P<0.05).
And furthermore, that “no significant benefit with respect to vitality” is only looking at either the primary outcome aggregated goal or the secondary FACIT score whose secondary outcome had a P value of 0.06, which just missed the cut-off for significance, and neglects to mention that all the other secondary outcome metrics for men involved in the vitality trial were very significant (ranging from P=0.04 to P=0.001)
Click here to see the results table for the vitality trial
Will it turn me into a musclebound angry ragey ‘roidmonster?
Were you that kind of person before your testosterone levels declined? If not, then no.
Testosterone therapy seeks only to return your testosterone levels to where they were, and this is done through careful monitoring and adjustment. It’d take a lot more than (responsible) endocrinologist-guided hormonal therapy to turn you into Marvel’s “Wolverine”.
Is testosterone therapy safe?
A question to take to your endocrinologist because everyone’s physiology is different, but a lot of studies do support its general safety for most people who are prescribed it.
As with anything, there are risks to be aware of, though. Perhaps the most critical risk is prostate cancer, and…
❝In a large meta-analysis of 18 prospective studies that included over 3500 men, there was no association between serum androgen levels and the risk of prostate cancer development
For men with untreated prostate cancer on active surveillance, TRT remains controversial. However, several studies have shown that TRT is not associated with progression of prostate cancer as evidenced by either PSA progression or gleason grade upstaging on repeat biopsy.
Men on TRT should have frequent PSA monitoring; any major change in PSA (>1 ng/mL) within the first 3-6 months may reflect the presence of a pre-existing cancer and warrants cessation of therapy❞
Those are some select extracts, but any of this may apply to you or your loved one, we recommend to read in full about this and other risks:
Risks of testosterone replacement therapy in men
See also: Prostate Health: What You Should Know
Beyond that… If you are prone to baldness, then taking testosterone will increase that tendency. If that’s a problem for you, then it’s something to know about. There are other things you can take/use for that in turn, so maybe we’ll do a feature on those one of these days!
For now, take care!
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Mediterranean Diet… In A Pill?
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Does It Come In A Pill?
For any as yet unfamiliar with the Mediterranean diet, you may be wondering what it involves, beyond a general expectation that it’s a diet popularly enjoyed in the Mediterranean. What image comes to mind?
We’re willing to bet that tomatoes feature (great source of lycopene, by the way, and if you’re not getting lycopene, you’re missing out), but what else?
- Salads, perhaps? Vegetables, olives? Olive oil, yea or nay?
- Bread? Pasta? Prosciutto, salami? Cheese?
- Pizza but only if it’s Romana style, not Chicago?
- Pan-seared liver, with some fava beans and a nice Chianti?
In fact, the Mediterranean diet is quite clear on all these questions, so to read about these and more (including a “this yes, that no” list), see:
What Is The Mediterranean Diet, And What Is It Good For?
So, how do we get that in a pill?
A plucky band of researchers, Dr. Chiara de Lucia et al. (quite a lot of “et al.”; nine listed authors on the study), wondered to what extent the benefits of the Mediterranean diet come from the fact that the Mediterranean diet is very rich in polyphenols, and set about testing that, by putting the same polyphenols in capsule form, and running a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled, crossover clinical intervention trial.
Now, polyphenols are not the only reason the Mediterranean diet is great; there are also other considerations, such as:
- a great macronutrient balance with lots of fiber, healthy fats, moderate carbs, and protein from select sources
- the absence or at least very low presence of a lot of harmful substances such as refined seed oils, added sugars, refined carbohydrates, and the like (“but pasta” yes pasta; in moderation and wholegrain and served with extra sources of fiber and healthy fats, all of which slow down the absorption of the carbs)
…but polyphenols are admittedly very important too; we wrote about some common aspects of them here:
Tasty Polyphenols: Enjoy Bitter Foods For Your Heart & Brain
As for what Dr. de Lucia et al. put into the capsule, behold…
The ingredients:
- Apple Extract 10.0%
- Pomegranate Extract 10.0%
- Tomato Powder 2.5%
- Beet, Spray Dried 2.5%
- Olive Extract 7.5%
- Rosemary Extract 7.5%
- Green Coffee Bean Extract (CA) 7.5%
- Kale, Freeze Dried 2.5%
- Onion Extract 10.0%
- Ginger Extract 10.0%
- Grapefruit Extract 2.5%
- Carrot, Air Dried 2.5%
- Grape Skin Extract 17.5%
- Blueberry Extract 2.5%
- Currant, Freeze Dried 2.5%
- Elderberry, Freeze Dried 2.5%
And the relevant phytochemicals they contain:
- Quercetin
- Luteolin
- Catechins
- Punicalagins
- Phloretin
- Ellagic Acid
- Naringin
- Apigenin
- Isorhamnetin
- Chlorogenic Acids
- Rosmarinic Acid
- Anthocyanins
- Kaempferol
- Proanthocyanidins
- Myricetin
- Betanin
And what, you may wonder, did they find? Well, first let’s briefly summarise the setup of the study:
They took volunteers (n=30), average age 67, BMI >25, without serious health complaints, not taking other supplements, not vegetarian or vegan, not consuming >5 cups of coffee per day, and various other stipulations like that, to create a fairly homogenous study group who were expected to respond well to the intervention. In contrast, someone who takes antioxidant supplements, already eats many different color plants per day, and drinks 10 cups of coffee, probably already has a lot of antioxidant activity going on, and someone with a lower BMI will generally have lower resting levels of inflammatory markers, so it’s harder to see a change, proportionally.
About those inflammatory markers: that’s what they were testing, to see whether the intervention “worked”; essentially, did the levels of inflammatory markers go up or down (up is bad; down is good).
For more on inflammation, by the way, see:
How to Prevent (or Reduce) Inflammation
…which also explains what it actually is, and some important nuances about it.
Back to the study…
They gave half the participants the supplement for a week and the other half placebo; had a week’s gap as a “washout”, then repeated it, switching the groups, taking blood samples before and after each stage.
What they found:
The group taking the supplement had lower inflammatory markers after a week of taking it, while the group taking the placebo had relatively higher inflammatory markers after a week of taking it; this trend was preserved across both groups (i.e., when they switched roles for the second half).
The results were very significant (p=0.01 or thereabouts), and yet at the same time, quite modest (i.e. the supplement made a very reliable, very small difference), probably because of the small dose (150mg) and small intervention period (1 week).
What the researchers concluded from this
The researchers concluded that this was a success; the study had been primarily to provide proof of principle, not to rock the world. Now they want the experiment to be repeated with larger sample sizes, greater heterogeneity, larger doses, and longer intervention periods.
This is all very reasonable and good science.
What we conclude from this
That ingredients list makes for a good shopping list!
Well, not the extracts they listed, necessarily, but rather those actual fruits, vegetables, etc.
If nine top scientists (anti-aging specialists, neurobiologists, pharmacologists, and at least one professor of applied statistics) came to the conclusion that to get the absolute most bang-for-buck possible, those are the plants to get the phytochemicals from, then we’re not going to ignore that.
So, take another list above and ask yourself: how many of those 16 foods do you eat regularly, and could you work the others in?
Want to make your Mediterranean diet even better?
While the Mediterranean diet is a top-tier catch-all, it can be tweaked for specific areas of health, for example giving it an extra focus on heart health, or brain health, or being anti-inflammatory, or being especially gut healthy:
Four Ways To Upgrade The Mediterranean
Enjoy!
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Blueberries vs Figs – Which is Healthier?
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Our Verdict
When comparing blueberries to figs, we picked the figs.
Why?
Both have their merits! But…
In terms of macros, figs have more fiber, carbs, and protein, making them the more nutrient-dense option in this category.
In the category of vitamins, blueberries have more of vitamins C, E, and K, while figs have more of vitamins A, B1, B2, B5, and B6, giving figs a fair-margined win here.
Looking at minerals next, blueberries have more manganese, while figs have a lot more calcium, copper, iron, magnesium, phosphorus, potassium, and selenium, easily winning their third round in a row.
In other considerations, blueberries are famously high in polyphenols, more so than figs, and that is a point in blueberries’ favor.
All the same, adding up the sections makes for a clear overall win for figs, but by all means enjoy either or both, as diversity is good!
Want to learn more?
You might like:
From Apples to Bees, and High-Fructose Cs: Which Sugars Are Healthier, And Which Are Just The Same? ← for any wondering about the sugariness of figs!
Enjoy!
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