Rapid Fat Loss Diets

Tuesday, January 19, 2010

Help! Can I Prevent Bruising Easily Altogether?

By Jan Doan

When capillaries break and blood accumulates under your skin you get a bruise (also known as a contusion). You can bruise your bones, your muscle or your skin. The skin bruise is the least painful. The bone bruise and muscle bruise tend to be the most painful and disrupting to your everyday life. You can prevent bruising easily altogether by observing safety rules.

Usually people bruise when they are hit by a ball, fall off their bikes, stumble down the stairs or something similar. To limit the possibility of bruising you need to take good care when you are involved in any activity. This means wearing your helmet when you ski, bike or skateboard. It also means buckling your seat belt when traveling in a car. Keeping your home and work spaces free of debris and clutter will minimize your risk of tripping.

There are those of us who seem to find bruises appearing out of nowhere. How come this happens? How can you prevent bruising easily altogether? Bruising risk increases if you are a smoker. It also increases when you are overweight, have anemia, leukemia or a bleeding disorder like hemophilia.

Certain medications also make people more prone to bruising. If you are taking a blood-thinning medication, such as Coumadin, anti-histamines, penicillin, anti-depressants or cortisone this could be your answer as to why you are bruising so easily. Talk to your doctor. He or she can change your medication if bruising is intolerable. Other causes of easy bruising include getting older, being deficient in B12, folic acid, and, very rarely, being deficient in vitamin K.

All in all, no matter what kinds of safety precautions or lifestyle changes you make, you cannot prevent easy bruising altogether. You will inevitably run into the dining room table or stub your toe on the cement. Still, in addition to being safe, you can do other things to lessen your likelihood of bruising quite so easily.

Your entire body, not just your capillaries, will thank you if you quit smoking and bring your body weight down. These two things alone will decrease the likelihood of bruising. Avoid taking aspirin and ibuprofen for pain as these over-the-counter medications thin your blood.

Very few people in the developed world have vitamin K deficiency unless there is some underlying medical issue. To give your vitamin K level an extra boost eat your vegetables, especially dark, leafy vegetables, broccoli, seaweed, kelp and alfalfa. You can purchase alfalfa or kelp tablets cheaply at your local health food store. In addition, blueberries, raspberries, strawberries and other types of berries, as well as citrus fruits, are high in bioflavinoids (anti-oxidants). Bioflavinoids will strength connective tissue. Increase your intake of lipoic acid by eating yams or carrots. Levels of zinc will remain healthy by consuming soy products and wheat germ. Taking a multivitamin daily is also worth consideration.

In the event that you do get a bruise (and you will), Arnica cream is known to speed healing and make bruising less painful. Arnica can also be taken in a homeopathic tablet or in an herbal tablet. Do not try and drain your bruise with a needle. This will make it worse and take it longer to heal.

It is virtually impossible to prevent bruising easily altogether. However, you can see that there are plenty of things you can do to decrease your risk and to improve your ability to heal more quickly. Be sure to see your physician if your bruise does not go away, hurts or if you find that you spontaneously bruise. - 17273

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