Blood clots : A very dangerous and common condition

Blood must perform an apparently impossible task: It must circulate smoothly and continuously throughout your body for the duration of your life, but it must also quickly stop flowing when you get cut or hurt in order to prevent spills.

Blood clots that halt bleeding are both beneficial and life-saving. However, they can also develop unnecessarily and result in a heart attack, stroke, or other serious medical issues.  

Causes Of Blood clots

Blood clots develop when specific components of your blood become thicker and solidify into a mass. This process can be initiated by an injury or it can occasionally take place inside blood vessels without a visible injury. 

Once they have formed, these clots have the potential to damage other areas of your body. Serious illnesses are linked to blood clots as well as factors and conditions that can induce bothersome blood clots. 

Your body clots your blood appropriately in response to an injury or cut. These clots do not cause any issues. A blood clot can occasionally grow on its own (such as an injury or cut). Certain risk factors or medical problems increase the likelihood of this occurring. Risk elements consist of:

• Extended periods of sitting (often the case with travel when you are forced to sit for long periods in an aeroplane, a train, or a car)
• Prolonged rest (often needed after surgery or during illness)
• Pregnancy
• Smoking
• Obesity
• Birth control pills, HRT, and medications for breast cancer
• Certain forms of cancer (pancreatic, lung, multiple myeloma, or blood-related cancers)
• Trauma (severe injury) 
• Some significant surgical procedures
• Age
• A history of blood clots in the family
• Immune system diseases
• Diseases influenced by persistent inflammation
• Several infections, including hepatitis C, HIV/AIDS, and Lyme disease

How to check if you have Blood clots? 

One of the most crucial decisions you will make if you believe you may be at risk for blood clots, or if you have been diagnosed with blood clots in your legs (deep vein thrombosis, or DVT), or blood clots in your lungs, is finding a healthcare provider you can trust and consider a good partner in your care (pulmonary embolism or PE).

Blood clots Risk Factor

In young, healthy individuals, blood clots are uncommon. 

Please seek medical care if any of the following apply to you:

•  If you are now in or have just left the hospital, particularly if you are unable to move about much (like after an operation) 
• If you are obese, smoke, use combination hormonal methods of birth control, such as the combined pill, a contraceptive patch, or a vaginal ring
•  If you have previously experienced a blood clot, are pregnant or recently gave birth
• If you have an inflammatory disease like Crohn's disease or rheumatoid arthritis. 

There are additional factors that raise your risk of blood clots.

Blood clots affect everyone equally. People of all ages, races, and genders are impacted. Knowing if you are at risk is one of the most crucial things you can do to prevent blood clots. The following are risk factors for blood clots:

• Visiting a hospital for treatment or surgery
• Major surgery, especially on the hip, knee, abdominal, and pelvis
• Severe injury, such that caused by a car accident
• A shattered bone or a serious muscle strain could have caused vein damage.
• Surgery to replace the knee or hip
• Cancer and its treatments
• Use of estrogen-containing birth control methods, such as the pill, patch, or ring
• Pregnancy, including the six weeks following the birth of the baby
• Hormone therapy with oestrogen

Blood clot Symptoms

Blood clots have a number of significant symptoms and indications. You can save your life or the life of a friend or family member if you can see these warning signs and symptoms.

• Swelling
• Warm skin
• Skin discolouration or redness
• Having trouble breathing
• Chest ache that gets worse while resting down or taking a big breath
• Coughing up blood or otherwise
• Irregular or faster-than-normal heartbeat

Prevention Of Blood clots

Blood clots can be safely treated and prevented. By becoming familiar with some of the most effective methods of avoiding potentially fatal blood clots, you can lower your risk.

• Understand your blood clot risk.
• Understand the symptoms and signs of blood clots.
• If you have any blood clot risk factors, let your doctor know.
• Discuss blood clots with your doctor prior to any type of surgery.
• If you do experience any blood clot symptoms, you should visit your doctor as soon as possible. 
• If you have been sitting for a while or in a car, train, or plane for a while, get up and move around. Each two to three hours, get up, walk around, and stretch your legs.
• Keep a healthy diet

Treatment Options Of Blood clots

The goal of treating blood clots, especially DVTs, is to stop them from developing or rupturing uninhibited. Your chance of developing new blood clots can be reduced with treatment.

The location and risk degree of the blood clot to you will determine the best course of therapy. Your doctor might advise one or more of the following treatments:

Medication: To prevent blood clots from forming, blood thinners and anticoagulants operate in tandem. In cases of life-threatening blood clots, medications known as thrombolytics can dissolve blood clots that have already formed.

Compression stockings: These form-fitting, tight stockings provide pressure to the legs to help with leg oedema reduction or to thwart the formation of blood clots.

Surgery: In a procedure called catheter-directed thrombolysis, doctors guide a catheter—a long tube—to the blood clot. Direct medication delivery to the clot by the catheter helps it. dissolve. Doctors gently remove a blood clot using specialised devices during thrombectomy surgery.

Stents: Medical professionals may determine if a stent is necessary to keep a blood vessel open.

Vena cava filters are put into the body's biggest vein, the inferior vena cava, when a patient is unable to take blood thinners to stop blood clots from travelling to the lungs.

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