What it is
Varithena® is polidocanol injectable foam — an FDA-approved microfoam with a controlled, uniform bubble structure. Injected into a vein, it displaces the blood rather than mixing with it, so the active agent contacts the vein wall directly along the whole treated length. The wall reacts, the vein collapses and seals, and the body absorbs it over the following weeks while blood reroutes through healthy veins.
The problem it solves
Catheter-based treatments such as radiofrequency ablation are excellent, and they need a vein a catheter can travel along. Real legs do not always provide one. Veins that are markedly tortuous, heavily branched, very superficial, or previously treated can be difficult or impossible to thread.
Foam does not care about shape. It flows into the branches and the bends, which is precisely where the catheter cannot go. That is why a practice that offers both can treat a wider range of anatomy properly, instead of applying one tool to every leg.
The appointment
The vein is located by ultrasound. Local anaesthetic numbs the entry point, and the foam is delivered through a small catheter or needle while the treatment is watched in real time on the ultrasound screen — one of the advantages of foam is that you can see it filling the vein.
The leg is then wrapped or fitted with compression, and you get up and walk. The whole thing takes under an hour. No general anaesthetic, no incisions, no stitches.
Afterwards
Compression stockings for the period specified, walking every day, and normal activity the same day. Strenuous exercise, heavy lifting, hot baths and saunas wait a short while.
Expect tenderness and firmness along the treated vein and some bruising; both settle over a few weeks. As with every vein treatment, the relief of aching and heaviness usually arrives before the change in appearance.
How it fits with everything else
Varithena®, radiofrequency ablation and sclerotherapy are not competing products — they are three tools for three different jobs, and the duplex ultrasound map is what assigns them. A typical plan might close the refluxing saphenous vein with ablation, treat a branched tributary with foam, and finish the surface vessels with sclerotherapy. You will be told which parts of that apply to you and why.