Frequently Asked Questions
1. What is Peripheral Artery Disease (PAD)?
PAD is a disorder in which the arteries in the limbs constrict or occlude, reducing blood circulation to the limbs.
2. What causes PAD?
PAD is mostly due to atherosclerosis where fatty materials accumulate in the arteries. These are the risk factors: smoking, diabetes, high blood pressure, and high cholesterol.
3. What are the signs of PAD?
Some of the symptoms are cramping leg pain during exercise (intermittent claudication), pain at rest, changes in skin color, slow wound healing, and in the worst affected cases, tissue death (gangrene).
4. Who is at risk for PAD?
It is found in smokers, diabetics, hypertensive, hypercholesterolemia, aged people above 65 years, family history, obesity and those who are physically inactive.
5. How is PAD diagnosed?
Some of the diagnostic procedures include clinical assessment, ABPI, TBI, monofilament tests, Doppler ultrasound, and angiography.
6. What are the management strategies of PAD?
Management entails cessation of smoking, exercising, taking a healthy diet, use of blood thinners, cholesterol-lowering drugs, and proper foot care.
7. Under what circumstances does a patient with PAD require surgery?
Surgery is required in extreme cases or when other methods of treatment prove to be ineffective. These are angioplasty, stenting, bypass surgeries, and endarterectomy.
8. What is angioplasty?
Angioplasty is an operation to unblock the arteries by using a small balloon and sometimes a stent is inserted.
9. What are the likely outcomes of the procedure?
The recovery time should be short and the patient will be given directions on how to take care of the wound, not to engage in any rigorous activities and the follow up appointments.
10. How is early detection of PAD beneficial?
Screening enables the diseases to be diagnosed in their early stages hence treatment is done before complications such as amputation and other cardiovascular diseases set in.
