Table 1.
Clinical practice survey: Treatment of advanced post-thrombotic syndrome (PTS) with no ulcer.
| Treatment modality | Respondents (of 35 total)a,b | Mean score | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | ||
| Lifestyle interventions | ||||||
| Periodic planned leg elevation | 0 | 5 | 3 | 13 | 11 | 3.94 |
| Education – avoid leg trauma | 0 | 1 | 1 | 14 | 17 | 4.45 |
| Supervised exercise program | 0 | 3 | 6 | 16 | 7 | 3.84 |
| Weight loss program | 2 | 6 | 5 | 10 | 7 | 3.47 |
| Smoking cessation program | 0 | 2 | 12 | 15 | 5 | 3.67 |
| Medical therapies | ||||||
| Anticoagulation beyond DVT care | 10 | 5 | 6 | 6 | 5 | 2.72 |
| Antiplatelet therapy | 14 | 7 | 2 | 8 | 1 | 2.22 |
| Pentoxifylline | 16 | 12 | 2 | 2 | 0 | 1.69 |
| Venoactive medications | 20 | 9 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1.56 |
| Diuretics | 20 | 5 | 6 | 2 | 0 | 1.70 |
| Oral NSAIDs | 9 | 7 | 10 | 4 | 0 | 2.30 |
| Topical NSAIDs | 15 | 10 | 6 | 0 | 1 | 1.81 |
| Compressive therapies | ||||||
| Graduated elastic stockings | 0 | 0 | 3 | 8 | 21 | 4.56 |
| Home edema pump | 4 | 9 | 12 | 5 | 2 | 2.75 |
| Wearable intermittent compression | 11 | 9 | 8 | 2 | 2 | 2.22 |
| Inelastic compression | 10 | 6 | 10 | 2 | 4 | 2.50 |
| ACE™ wraps | 12 | 4 | 8 | 2 | 0 | 2.00 |
| Endovascular therapies | ||||||
| Stent iliac/CFV | 2 | 5 | 6 | 3 | 14 | 3.73 |
| Extend stents into chronic FP DVT | 10 | 9 | 6 | 4 | 2 | 2.32 |
| EVTA refluxing saphenous | 2 | 6 | 6 | 1 | 15 | 3.70 |
| CDT for chronic FP DVT | 10 | 8 | 5 | 6 | 3 | 2.50 |
| US-CDT for chronic FP DVT | 11 | 9 | 5 | 4 | 2 | 2.25 |
| Angioplasty for chronic FP DVT | 7 | 10 | 9 | 2 | 2 | 2.40 |
Respondents were asked to rate each modality using these categories. It was recognized that this is a non-validated, non-ordinal system, but means were calculated to try to summarize the information.
1 = I don’t believe this works and recommend it rarely or never; 2 = I believe this could be beneficial but recommend it rarely or never; 3 = I believe this could be beneficial and recommend it occasionally; 4 = I use this regularly but am not sure if it’s really working; 5 = I use this regularly and am reasonably confident it works.
All rows do not add up to 35 since some questionnaires were incomplete.
NSAID, non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drug; CFV, common femoral vein; FP, femoropopliteal; DVT, deep vein thrombosis; EVTA, endovenous thermal ablation; CDT, catheter-directed thrombolysis; US-CDT, ultrasound-assisted catheter-directed thrombolysis.