Cosmetic Vein Center
St. Elizabeth’s Medical Center
Call for an appointment
The Cosmetic Vein Center at St. Elizabeth’s Medical Center offers both cosmetic and therapeutic treatments of varicose veins and spider veins. In addition, physicians are specifically educated and trained to assess, diagnose, educate, and treat patients with venous disease.
Our Team
Mark Conrad, MD
Surgery, Vascular Surgery
Treatments and Services
Our treatments for varicose and spider veins include:
- Endovenous thermal ablation: A minimally invasive treatment that involves the insertion of a thin, flexible tube called a catheter into a diseased vein and uses heat to seal it shut. Blood that would normally return toward the heart through these veins will then travel through other veins instead. Over time the treated vein shrinks and is absorbed by the body.
- Sclerotherapy: A procedure used to treat the veins (both spider and small varicose veins) by injecting a solution directly into the vein. The solution irritates the vein and causes the walls to close off. It eventually turns into scar tissue and is reabsorbed into the body, effectively disappearing.
- Foam sclerotherapy: A relatively new method to treat larger veins that traditional schlerotherapy may not be able to address. A sterile foam is first injected into the vein to displace the blood. Then, the schlerotherapy solution is injected into the vein. By displacing the blood with the foam, the treatment has more direct contact with the vein walls and can work as intended.
- Vein stripping: A small incision is made in the groin area and usually another incision is made in the calf below the knee. Then a physician disconnects and ties off all major varicose vein branches associated with the saphenous vein, the main superficial vein in your leg. Then the saphenous vein is removed from the leg.
- Stab phlebectomy: Also called ambulatory phlebectomy, this procedure can be done alone or together with vein stripping. Stab phlebectomy allows a physician to remove individual varicose vein clusters from the leg using hooks passed through small incisions. Because the incisions are so small, they don’t require stitches, there is very little pain and a shorter recovery period.