People who have to stop after walking a few steps may have "intermittent claudication". What is this disease and where is its seriousness? How can it be prevented?
When a person suffers from sudden pain in the leg muscles while walking, he may think it is just a muscle spasm or strain, but he does not know that he may suffer from "intermittent claudication," says the German Society for Vascular Diseases.
The association warns that people with this disease are at risk of developing cardiovascular diseases, and the risk may amount to heart attacks.
What is "intermittent claudication"?
It is a disease that affects the posterior muscles of the leg, causing pain when walking or exercising. The disease arises by the influence of other diseases in the blood vessels, especially atherosclerosis, where the arteries narrow due to plaque deposits in their walls, which impedes blood flow in them.
Initially the disease does not cause any discomfort at rest, but when moving, walking or exercising, the disease causes pain.
This is due to the fact that when doing activities, the demand for oxygen increases in the body, but vascular diseases make the blood circulation unable to deliver enough oxygen to these areas, which causes the muscles to receive a very small amount of it.
According to the German Society of Vascular Diseases, those at risk of peripheral vascular disease and thus "intermittent claudication" are often people over the age of sixty in addition to smokers, people with diabetes, obesity, or who have problems with blood pressure.
Constant cold feet and difficult wound healing may be primary signs of the disease.
As for the symptoms of the disease, they are in the form of pain that is transmitted from the leg muscles to the thigh when walking for a distance exceeding 200 meters. And those pains stop at stopping, and hence the disease was called "intermittent claudication."
The German Society for Vascular Diseases stresses the need to see a doctor when observing the emergence of symptoms of the disease, noting that the disease can be treated well when diagnosed early.
According to the association, adopting a healthy lifestyle such as healthy nutrition and weight reduction reduces the risk of contracting disease and other vascular diseases.