The weather is getting colder and colder, soaking your feet before going to bed in winter has become one of the essential items for many of your friends to “get well”. I, myself and my family, also like to soak our feet. However, I am a vascular surgeon, and in our clinic, I often encounter patients with vascular disease who are suffering from foot soaks. Therefore, I would like to take this opportunity to remind these patients that foot soaking is not suitable for everyone, and it is more harmful than beneficial for patients with vascular disease, and it often leads to aggravation or worsening of the condition, or even disaster. The more people have lower extremity vascular disease, often the more likely to feel cold lower extremities, the natural thought of hot water soaking feet, but such people are not suitable for foot soaking, why? Consider carefully Varicose veins and venous thrombosis. Patients with varicose veins and venous thrombosis, when hot water soaking feet, the body will undergo such changes: 1, the lower extremity artery expansion, especially manifested as skin congestion, that more arterial blood will enter the lower extremity; 2, however, the venous reflux capacity does not increase; 3, so, hot water soaking feet for the original poor reflux or obstruction of venous disease patients, will aggravate the blood stasis; 4, in addition to hot Soaking feet can also lead to capillary rupture, forming bleeding spots on the skin; 5, over time, pigmentation will form, and the color of the calf will become dark; 6, if the patient with venous thrombosis is taking anticoagulant drugs, the bleeding will be more serious. Adding insult to injury arterial occlusion ischemia Another kind of foot soak is not suitable for patients with lower limb arterial occlusion, the performance of this disease though ischemia of the lower limbs. Unfortunately, hot water soaking feet, and can not expand the occluded blood vessels, and can not improve the symptoms of ischemia. In general, the dilation of a patent artery increases blood flow to normal tissues. However, for ischemic tissues, the increase in peripheral temperature can increase the oxygen consumption of the tissues and worsen ischemia, so the ischemic tissues may become even more ischemic due to foot soaking. For patients with arterial occlusion, we adopt the following treatment principle: instead of vasodilators, we choose anticoagulants or antiplatelet drugs. In the case of ischemia, the use of infrared heat therapy with heating effect must be prohibited even though the legs are cold, and soaking the feet is not allowed. Patients with diabetic foot facing amputation There are three types of diabetic foot: “neuropathic”, “ischemic” and “mixed”. Some patients with neuropathy type can show that their legs and feet feel oddly cold and afraid of cold. Therefore, hot water foot soaking can easily become a comfortable option. The tragedy is that once neuropathy is present, the patient’s sensory feedback mechanism for pain and water temperature fails. Patients therefore tend to keep heating the water, even if they have been severely scalded, unaware of it. Patients with ischemic diabetic foot face a problem similar to the above mentioned “arterial occlusive disease”. Not to mention the mixed type patients, foot soaking is a no-no. You can also learn about diabetic foot by going back to the main page and looking up “diabetic foot”. Conclusion: For those who have lower limb arterial occlusive disease and diabetic foot, high temperature foot soaking can lead to amputation! And friends with lower extremity vascular disease, please consider carefully before soaking feet. This is definitely not alarming. Knowing these truths, it is recommended that you clarify whether you have the above-mentioned vascular diseases before soaking your feet; if not, you can enjoy it without worry. If this article can be seen by the staff of the footbath store, it would be better. Because not long ago, I met a mixed diabetic foot patient with foot necrosis, after foot soaking in a footbath store, foot necrosis accelerated.