Health & Wellbeing
The Link Between Deep Vein Thrombosis (DVT) And Pulmonary Embolism.
If you have been told that you have one or more DVT blood clots, the interventional radiologists at MTVIR want to re-iterate what you have probably already been told by your doctors. That is, DVT is a life-threatening condition, and you should really take it seriously.
We say this because we’ve run into far too many patients who don’t take their vein disease seriously. Often times patients read online suggestions or hear from friends and family that varicose veins and spider veins are “merely cosmetic” and don’t really require any treatment. This isn’t true, even for those vein diseases, but it certainly isn’t true about DVT, which is a much more dangerous type of vein disease.
What is DVT and why is it dangerous?
Deep Vein Thrombosis is the condition that results when the large veins in your legs, as the result of damage or disease, begin to develop thrombi (blood clots) in them. These blood clots typically attach themselves to the inner walls of the blood vessels where they form. They are harmful to your health even if they stay where they formed, because they block the efficient flow of blood from your extremities to your lungs and heart. But it’s when the blood clots break loose and travel through the veins that a much more serious condition — Pulmonary embolism — becomes a possibility.
An embolism is a blood clot that travels through the veins and causes a blockage somewhere else in the venous system. The lungs are the most likely destination of blood clots caused by DVT, so if this happens, the resulting condition is called a pulmonary embolism (PE). It is dangerous because a blockage to one or more of the pulmonary arteries can be fatal.
Why do you need to know this if you have DVT?
PE kills 60,000–100,000 Americans per year. And the link between deep vein thrombosis and pulmonary embolism has been so strongly established that doctors refer to the condition using a single acronym: DVT/PE.
So if you have DVT, it really is important that you follow your doctors’ instructions. Take the medications and blood thinners that have been prescribed to you, wear compression stockings, and follow all recommendations as to diet and exercise. These things won’t dissolve or remove the existing blood clots, but they’ll help to keep them from causing embolisms.
If you want to investigate treatments that can remove the blood clots to eliminate the danger, give us a call at 469-458-9800 to schedule an appointment or Request an appointment here. Then we can determine whether you are a candidate for the advanced, minimally-invasive interventional radiology options that MTVIR specializes in, treatments that can eliminate the blood clots altogether. To learn more about MTVIR’s treatment of DVT follow this link Vascular Interventions
