Raynaud’s Syndrome

 

Raynaud’s syndrome is also called Raynaud’s disease or Raynaud’s phenomenon.

Raynaud’s syndrome is a widespread pathological phenomenon manifested by frequent episodes of vascular constriction in the fingertips and legs, usually caused by exposure to cold or stress.

Raynaud’s fingers pass thru three stages of change:

1. At first, the fingers become white.
2. Then blue fingertips, which may sometimes be accompanied by some pain,
3. Finally, after the fingers are warmed, the color turns red.

The most likely places for Raynaud syndrome are the fingers and legs, but it can appear elsewhere as well, such as the tip of the nose, inside ear flint, tongue, or nipples in rare cases.

Raynaud syndrome is a widespread phenomenon around the world, with a prevalence of about 5% in women and 4% in men, and even wider in cold places.

This phenomenon is caused by a malfunction in the process of regulating blood flow in the capillary blood vessels, which includes excessive secretion of substances that cause vascular constriction and an exaggerated reaction from the blood vessels to these substances, such as severe constriction and failure of reactions that have a duty to expand blood vessels again.

Symptoms of Raynaud’s syndrome

The signs and symptoms of Raynaud’s syndrome include:

1. cold fingers and feet.
2. changes in skin color in response to cold or stress.
3. numbness, prickly feeling, or pain when your body temperature rises or relieves stress.

After warm-up, it can take about 15 minutes for normal blood flow to return to the area.

causes and risk factors for Raynaud syndrome.

The main causes and factors that increase the risk of Raynaud syndrome include:

Causes of Primary Raynaud’s syndrome

When it’s cold, your body tries to keep the heat, as one way to do this is to slow blood flow to areas farther away from your heart, hands, and feet. To do this, the network of small arteries that transport blood to those points narrows, keeping them away from your skin.

If you have Raynaud, these arteries shrink more than usual and faster than normal, as they can make your fingers and toes feel numb and change color to white or blue, usually lasting about 15 minutes.

When your arteries relax and your body returns to warmth, your fingers feel tingly and turn red before returning to normal, as you may have changes in the genes that control your response, but doctors have found no link between this and Raynaud syndrome.

Causes of Raynaud’s secondary syndrome

The mechanism for developing secondary Raynaud’s syndrome is similar to the first, but you get it as a result of another disease. The conditions that make you most likely to get secondary Raynaud disease include:

• Connective tissue diseases
  If you have dermatitis, a rare disease that causes your skin to harden and scar, you are likely to have Raynaud’s disease, lupus, rheumatoid arthritis, and Sjogren’s syndrome.
• Arterial disease
  This includes atherosclerosis, the accumulation of deposits in the blood vessels that feed your heart, Buerger’s disease, which causes inflammation of the blood vessels in your hands and feet, and primary pulmonary hypertension, which is a type of high blood pressure that affects the arteries in your lungs.
• Carpal tunnel syndrome
  Pressing the main nerve in your hand can cause numbness and pain and make you more sensitive to cold.
• Repetitive action or vibration
  Any movement you make over and over again, such as writing, or playing the piano, can cause injury, as well as the use of vibrating instruments, such as rock hole machines, in injury as well.
• Smoking
  Smoking narrows blood vessels.
• injuries
  Damage to your hands, feet as a result of fractures, surgery or frostbite includes damage to your hands.
• Certain medications
  These include high blood pressure treatments such as beta blockers, migraine medications, some types of chemotherapy and medications that narrow blood vessels, such as non-prescription cold medications.

Risk factors for Raynaud syndrome

Some factors can increase your risk of developing the condition, such as:

1. women are nine times more likely to develop it than men.
2. it usually appears between the ages of 15 and 25, but people of all ages can get primary raynaud’s disease.
3. people with secondary Raynaud’s disease tend to get it after the age of 35.
4. people with diseases such as rheumatoid arthritis, skin stiffness, and lupus are more likely to develop secondary Raynaud disease.

Complications of Raynaud’s syndrome

if secondary Raynaud is severe, which is rare, low blood flow to the fingers or feet can damage tissues, and complete artery blockage can lead to skin ulcers, or tissue death, both of which may be difficult to treat.

severe untreated cases rarely require the removal of the affected part of your body.

diagnosis of Raynaud syndrome

the most prominent methods of diagnosis include:

1. Antibody test
   Positive testing of these antibodies may be a sign of a stimulating immune system, which is common in people with connective tissue diseases or other autoimmune disorders.
2. Sedimentation rate test
   This test determines the stability of red blood cells at the bottom of the tube, where a faster than normal rate may indicate inflammatory disease or autoimmune disease.

Treatment of Raynaud’s syndrome

there is no cure for Raynaud’s disease, but there are ways to control symptoms.

1. for mild forms of Raynaud’s disease, covering exposed skin before leaving the house
2. soaking the affected parts in warm, not hot water, can relieve symptoms and prevent their exacerbation.

1. drug therapy

If stress is a factor, learning to control stress can help, but for moderate to severe cases, the drug may be necessary, as follows:

• Alpha-1 blockers
  This group of medications can resist the norepinephrine effect that restricts blood vessels, and examples include Doxazosin and Prazosin.
• Dihydropyridine calcium channel blockers
  Dihydroperidine calcium channel blockers relax smaller blood vessels in the hands and feet, and examples include Amlodipine, Nifedipine and Felodipine.
• Topical nitroglycerin ointment
  the local nitroglycerin ointment applied to the affected area appears to relieve symptoms by improving blood flow and lowering blood pressure.
• Other vasodilators
  These drugs expand veins and relieve symptoms, including losartan, sildenafil, Fluoxetine and Prostaglandin.

2. surgical treatment

in very severe cases, surgical procedures are an option where a friendly removal can be performed, in which vasodilation that causes renaud is controlled by friendly nerves in the affected areas.

The surgeon can make small incisions and strip nerves of blood vessels to reduce the frequency or severity of seizures, but this is not always successful.

prevention of renaud syndrome

The disease cannot be prevented.

Types of Raynaud syndrome

the most prominent types of Raynaud syndrome include:

1. Raynaud’s primary syndrome
   It occurs without any other disease behind it, and the symptoms are often mild.
2. Raynaud’s secondary syndrome
   Raynaud syndrome is caused by another disease. It is often a condition that attacks connective tissues in the body, such as lupus or rheumatoid arthritis.

The occurrence of this syndrome is less common, but is likely to cause serious health problems. As such, it can include things such as skin ulcers and gangrene that occur when cells and tissues in your toes and fingers die from hypoglycemia.