An epidemiological study of varicose veins in Indian railroad workers from the South and North of India, with special reference to the causation and prevention of varicose veins

Abstract

A survey to determine the prevalence of varicose veins among railwaymen of identical socio-economic status and doing identical work of sweepers in the North and South of India showed that the overall prevalence was significantly higher among South Indian sweepers (25.08 per cent) than among North Indian sweepers (6.8 per cent). The survey included 323 men from Madras in the South and 354 men from Ajmer in the North of India. While constipation, body weight, smoking, posture and tight undergarments do not appear to contribute to the causation of varicose veins, the role of heredity could not be examined in this study. Big differences were present in blood-clotting time and in clot-lysis between these two populations, the respective values for clotting time being 6 minutes in South Indians and 8 minutes 40 seconds for North Indians (P ⋞ 0.001), and for clot-lysis being 3.7 per cent in South Indians and 25 per cent in North Indians. In order to test the cause-and-effect relationship of these haematological indices 24 North Indians and 81 South Indians with varicose veins were compared with 24 healthy North Indian controls and 81 South Indian controls with no varicose veins. Clot-lysis was markedly higher in those with no varicose veins than in those with varicose veins, but the mean blood clotting times were not significantly different between these two. Since such differences are known to be diet related, this study suggests that, in the prevalence of varicose veins, patterns of diet and eating may play an important part. Therefore, there would seem to be hope that this disease may be prevented.