Comment by Damogran6 | Hacker News Reader

Comment by Damogran6 | Hacker News Reader

Parent Full thread

Our conversations amongst ourselves turn to our ailments. The bell curve of people that pass before you do starts to accelerate. My skin, with the help of the sun, has twice tried to -KILL- me.

But the biggie were the veins in my legs. The valves are giving out, my feet are too far from my heart. 15% of my blood isn't getting properly oxygenated.

And then I got that taken care of. A procedure for a thing my father had (he passed 20 years ago)...and I'm really sad he didn't experience it.

Because the treatment made my feel 15 years younger. My balance is better (a factor of the nerves now getting oxygen), my foot and knee stopped hurting....and what gets me is both how much BETTER I feel, but that it was my body WEARING OUT.

Wilfred Brimley (a name that dates me merely by mentioning it) was my age in Cocoon (look it up, kids)...that was where all the old, used up, worn out people found rejuvenation.

I don't feel that old...doubly so now that my circulation has improved.

But you and I both know of 90 year olds that are 'younger' than some 60 year olds.

> But you and I both know of 90 year olds that are 'younger' than some 60 year olds.

I once had a rough hike at Half Dome that went deep into the early morning hours (a friend, who was an experienced alpine climber, made the horrible decision to bring his girlfriend at the time who had never even been on a hike before but was "in shape," and so they thought it would "be fine" -- it was NOT) and it was a total mess. We make it back to the trailhead around 2AM and a van pulls in. A 95 year old woman got out with her support team, they were starting the hike up so she could catch the sunrise from Half Dome.

I'm curious, what is wrong with the veins in your legs, more exactly? My dad, 68, has periphery artery disease and, well, it sucks.

There's something like 6 one way valves that let your heart pump the blood out of your leg a little bit at a time. When they wear out, there's not enough pumping action at times to replace the blood as often as necessary. (also, the veins aren't rated for the pressure, which is why they blow out, and you get varicose or spider veins.)

But there are alternate paths for the blood to flow. If you mangle the larger deep veins, the blood will still circulate out secondary paths. And literally the next day, my foot was pink, and I wasn't winded climbing the stairs, and my legs weren't lead weights by the end of the day.

> There's something like 6 one way valves that let your heart pump the blood out of your leg a little bit at a time. When they wear out, there's not enough pumping action at times to replace the blood as often as necessary.

Shouldn't we be able to replace them with man-made ones as they fail, like already it's possible to do with heart valves[1]?

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Artificial_heart_valve

Quite possibly. The procedure they performed on me is already in at least the 3rd major iteration. Originally they'd replace the vein with cadaver veins...then they used wires to...ahem...catch and rip out the old vein.

They used a catheter on me using RF to ablate the vein so it would no longer flow blood. Recovery was quick. (Wear support stockings for a week, you can move around as normal the next day...don't run a marathon or lift weights.)

It was _very_ low impact.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com