You take a long walk on a very warm day as you work up a sweat and you find that you cannot put your rings back on your hands as a result. That is because your hands are swollen. You may find that after going in a hot tub, and you are confused why your hands can sometimes swell up but at other times they don’t. You thought that the swelling of hands was attributed to pregnancy, but it can happen to anyone, male or female. Is it something to worry about when your hands swell up which is also known as edema? Let’s talk about it now.
Swelling Of The Hands Is Caused By Fluid Buildup
You may already realize that swollen hands are caused by fluid buildup in tissues in your hands. Temperature changes can most definitely be a culprit, which is something to never worry about. However, underlying conditions can also be the culprit which is why if the hands are swelling on a cool day and you are not doing anything strenuous, you will want to have a doctor examine why you have swelling. You already know that pregnancy is one condition that can cause swelling of the hands, face, and feet. Chances are that is not why you would be experiencing that if you are reading this. However, sometimes those reasons are benign and may also signify that you need to make some lifestyle changes. Let’s go over the benign reasons that you have swelling in your hands, and then cover the serious reasons you have it as well.
The Benign Reasons For Swelling Of The Hands
As you already know, hot weather and being active as well can cause your hands to swell up. That is all because the blood vessels in your hands expand to send more blood to the skin by helping it cool down. When the vessels expand, other fluids can get into them. The same applies after a long workout, and the best thing to do in hot weather and when exercising is to drink a lot of water to help flush it. Also, you may find that when you wake up in the morning, fluid buildup ends up in your hands because of lying still for so many hours overnight. The best thing to do is to do stretching exercises to flush it each morning. Now, let’s go over the signs to watch out for indicated by swollen hands.
What To Watch For In Swollen Hands
There are reasons that edema may not be something to ignore, especially if you were not sleeping, exercising, or spending a lot of time in the heat. If you eat a lot of salt, that can cause you to build up fluid in your hands. That in itself is not serious. However, if you keep eating a lot of salt, it will lead to hypertension and you will have the risk of cardiovascular disease, stroke, and kidney disease. If you have kidney or liver disease, you also can have swelling in your hands but you also would have other worrisome symptoms. Sometimes if you are on chemotherapy, it can cause your hands to swell up too. However, this can be troublesome if you are struggling to breathe and have a fast heartbeat. Therefore, always get medical treatment if this happens. Finally, you can deal with swelling in your hands if you have arthritis. You can have conditions like rheumatoid arthritis if you have edema.
Therefore, if you have edema, and you are generally healthy, chances are you over-exerted yourself, and lying down for long periods will do it too. Or if you have a meal that is very salty, that can happen. However, you will want to make sure you are careful with your salt intake so it does not lead to serious conditions. The best thing to do is to drink water to flush it.
