Scelotherapy for ugly spider veins on ankle, is it possible to remove them at my age? (photo)

Prominent veins around the ankles can be difficult to treat due to the pressure of the blood in the veins in this location.  Veins in this location may be due to chronic venous insufficiency, which is a condition where the blood in some of your superficial veins moves backwards down the legs rather than up the legs. This backwards flow of blood increases the pressure in the smaller branches, causing them to become visible and unsightly. If you have any symptoms of swelling, aching, pain, or fatigue in your legs, I would recommend seeing a board-certified Vascular Surgery Who specializes in vain disease for a complete evaluation which would include a venous ultrasound. If the venous ultrasound is normal, they will likely be very comfortable treating your visible veins. 

Thank you for your photos. Sclerotherapy would be a great option to treat your veins. Sclerotherapy treatment involves an injection of a chemical that will cause your vein to contract and become scarred internally. The vein will disappear from your body after some time. Generally, it takes about 8-10 weeks for the vein to disappear. You could also try laser resurfacing and microneedling. For more information, I recommend getting a in person consultation from a board-certified dermatologist.

The veins in the ankle are treatable and we do it all the time.  Sometimes, there is a cause higher up the leg and this can be a sign of venous insufficiency and pressure within the veins.  I would recommend seeing a vein specialist and discussing various options, sclerotherapy or if you have more symptoms possibly an ultrasound to see if there is an underlying cause of venous insufficiency causing these veins. 

These spider veins can be easily treated with sclerotherapy. However, clusters of spider veins around the ankles, especially the inner ankles are often due to underlying venous disease. It would be best to get a thorough evaluation from a vein specialist.  They may recommend an ultrasound of the veins in your legs to determine the best treatment for you.

Hi and thank you for your question. I encourage you to schedule a consultation and ultrasound scan of your legs with a board certified vein specialist. This first step is the key to confirm if there is an underlying venous disease, then, it can be determine your treatment plan correctly. In general, healthy leg veins contain unidirectional valves that open and close to help the blood return back to the heart. There is a condition called venous insufficiency that develops when the valves that keep blood flowing out of the legs and back to heart do not work correctly, causing to pool in the legs and leading to signs and symptoms equal to veins like yours among other symptoms such as swelling, pain, cramps, burning sensation, itching of the skin, and ulcers. This can be medically treated by a vein specialist as well as taking care of the appearance concern. 

I treat these veins almost daily with sclerotherapy with excellent results.   Topical laser to this area is not a good choice. See a vein specialist.

The dermatologist was correct in that ankle spider veins can be more difficult to treat.  The reason is that the pressure on those veins is higher.  If the valves in your veins are not working, which is the primary cause of varicose and spider veins, then think of your veins as a column of water.  The deeper you go in a column of water the higher the pressure is.  Therefore, the veins in your ankles are under much higher pressure than the veins in the thighs.  This can result in failure of the veins to close after initial sclerotherapy.  That doesn't mean you can't have successful treatment of those veins.  Sclerotherapy is the standard of care for spider veins in this area and will give much better results than laser.  I would recommend an ultrasound to look for reflux (backwards flow) in the veins of the leg above the ankle.  If you only treat the visible veins but don't fix any underlying veins that may be above the ankle, you won't get the results you want.  A good analogy is that if you have a leaky roof ruining the paint on your walls, you can't just paint the wall.  You have to fix the leak first and then paint.  I'd recommend seeing a physician who is boarded in venous and lymphatic medicine. Cost is highly variable depending upon region and what the primary source of the problem veins is.  There should be no real downtime.  I discourage flying after sclerotherapy and you should wear compression stockings for a week after but you can resume normal activity immediately after the procedure and activity is encouraged.