Now that we’ve discussed what bruising is, and the types and levels, what are some of the common causes? Why are some people more predisposed to bruising than others?

Of course, asking, “what causes bruising” seems too simple at first; everyone believes or knows bruises are caused by blunt trauma to the body, because everyone at some point has experienced a bruise. Yet, bruising isn’t just caused by everyday bangs and bumps.

Besides common everyday accidents, which usually cause mild bruising, more intense accidents such as car wrecks, falls, or other trauma are a major cause of moderate to severe bruises.

Sports and exercise are also major causes, especially for those participating in impact sports such as football or soccer, or those who mountain bike, surf, rock climb and the like. Bruises in athletes are often the result of tiny microscopic tears in blood vessels under the skin caused by physical stress.

Surgery or other medical procedures, especially near bones such as procedures on the face, hands or feet, are known for causing mild to moderate bruises.  Oral surgery, plastic surgery and some dermalogical procedures are common causes of medical procedure bruising.

Medications taken to “thin or regulate the blood” can increase the appearance of bruises for some. Minor bumps can result in a bruise since the layers of tissue allow thinner blood to pool.

Those people with blood disorders and bleeding conditions such as certain types of hemophilia typically experience more frequent bruising. If bruises are re-occurring and unexplained, this may indicate a medical problem that needs to be diagnosed and treated, especially if the bruises are accompanied by nosebleeds, bleeding gums, nose bleeds and other related symptoms.

Other common causes of Bruising:

• Aspirin and even some common supplements like fish oil
• Severe vomiting and coughing, such as those with the flu
• Blood-related diseases such as leukemia and certain types of cancer
• Liver diseases, such as cirrhosis
• Lymphomas

Nutritional deficiencies, such as deficiency in vitamins C, K, B12, or folic acid

• Sepsis, or severe infection in the bloodstream
• Systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE)  or other auto immune diseases
• Existing allergies, or allergies to certain medications

There are other factors at play as well:

• Women bruise more easily than men due to more subcutaneous fat.
• Age. As we age our skin and tissues become thinner and less elastic making the elderly especially prone to bruising.
• Skin color. Although medically the same, bruises look more severe on those with lighter skin

We are listening! What say you?

We’ve already listed Doctor recommended ways to deal with bruises and information on about Bruise Relief andHow It Works. Here’s a list of common myths and things NOT to do when treating bruises. Enjoy! And please comment with any other remedies …

“Put a raw steak on it.” Who hasn’t heard this advice at one point or another when dealing with a bruise? Yet, advice like our raw steak example isn’t necessarily helpful, and some advice about how to care for bruises can actually cause more bruising and even additional health problems.

Black Pepper. While there have been some claims in natural medicine that black pepper can decrease pain in the body overall and stimulate blood circulation, ingesting black pepper or rubbing black pepper on a bruise does absolutely nothing. In fact, it can actually cause skin irritation. Save the black pepper for the dinner table.

Hot Pepper Sauce or Cayenne Pepper. The idea is the hot peppers “numb” the skin and decrease sensitivity. The opposite is actually true, as hot pepper, like black pepper can cause skin irritation. Hot peppers do nothing to help bruises.

Raw Meat/Raw Steak. Common in old black and white movies from Hollywood, starlets and stars were often seen on the silver screen treating black eyes and other bruises with a big raw hunk of a Porterhouse steak. There are no special properties, enzymes or proteins in raw meat that get under the skin and help with bruises. Raw meat can be cold, which is a great way to prevent the spreading of bruises and encourage clotting. However, an icepack or cold compress does the job just as well, and is way more hygienic.

Mustard. Another big no-no. Mustard “pastes” or “poultices” (a compress with a paste of mustard) have been around for centuries and were a popular remedy when placed on the stomach or back for upset tummies and other intestinal problems. However, some mustard pastes are potent, and can cause skin irritation, eye irritation, and even blindness. They do nothing to help bruises. Please see Wiki-Pedia for the facts about mustard pastes and poultices.

Honey. Ancient texts write about honey as an antiseptic and overall skin conditioner. While popular in beauty masks, honey does not treat bruises. It’s best left as a sweetener for your tea.

Massaging the Bruise.  This is a big no-no. It might be tempting to massage a leg or other muscles that may have some combination of straining, spraining, cramps and bruises at the same time. However, while a massage might alleviate some pain, it can also increase blood flow to the area making the bruise worse. In some cases massage can even cause more damage to already damaged tissues. Wait until bruises diminish before getting a massage to the area.

Petroleum Jelly – Vaseline® There are lots of claims on the internet that Petroleum Jelly can reduce the color of bruises. Boxers and other athletes often do use Petroleum Jelly to prevent and treat abrasions, cuts and other skin irritations. However, there is no scientific proof that Petroleum Jelly can reduce the color or swelling of bruises.

Baking Soda. A bath with baking soda is often recommended to help relax sore and tired muscles. However baking soda, either in a bath or rubbed on a bruise does absolutely nothing to reduce bruises.

Vinegar. Vinegar, especially Apple Cider Vinegar is often touted as a cure-all for everything from headaches to acne. Advice to heal a bruise by dabbing it with Vinegar are completely unfounded. You’ll also end up smelling like a pickle.

Preparation H. Popular w/ models, actors and those into beauty remedies for under eye puffiness and circles. Preparation H does numb the area and can decrease minor swelling on the skin, but will does not treat bruising underneath the skin. It also smells fairly strongly of menthol.

Bruise Relief® These remedies are interesting and worth considering when in a pinch (without Bruise Relief®), and some are even entertaining. But its important to remember, we all know what to put on a cut, Band Aids®. Now we know what to put on a bruise, Bruise Relief®.

This was a fun post to pull together. Please comment and share any other remedies …

In our part 1 of 5 series on Bruising we discussed the basics of bruises – what they are, how they form, and how the body reacts to bruises. In this post we will be discussing the different types and levels of bruises. Although Bruise Relief^® brand products work better on some bruise-types than others (and, remember it is not designed to work on all bruises) – knowing the types of bruises helps to know how to best treat them.

Bruises generally fall into two broad types: (1) Contusions and (2) Ecchymosis. Contusions are simply another name for a “typical” bruise - caused when blood vessels or capillaries are damaged or broken as the result of an impact to the skin. Ecchymosis is the skin discoloration caused by the escape of blood into the tissues from ruptured blood vessels. The purple-hued, flat bruise that occurs when blood leaks out into the top layers of skin is referred to as an ecchymosis if it is larger than 1 centimeter. Ecchymosis can also occur in other areas of the body, such as under the nails, or in mucus membranes in the nose or mouth, especially when experiencing a cold or sinus infection.

Bruising can occur at 3 levels:

• Subcutaneous — Bruising beneath the skin. These are the most common bruises and ecchymosis. They are also the kind that Bruise Relief^® brand products work really well on, especially when applied soon after the impact or injury and enough gel or serum is applied and allowed to absorb into the area before it is rubbed off.

• Intramuscular –These are often known as “deep bruises” and typically form in the belly of underlying muscles, for example the hamstrings or calves.

• Periosteal –These are bone bruise, often the most painful and the one that may often require medical treatment. They can take months to heal.

The severity of bruises is determined by medical professionals by gauging the size of the bruise, but the type of bruise, the number of bruises and other factors — such as how the bruise occurred, where it is located, the person’s age, and the size and duration of the bruises all play an important part in the equation.

Bigger does not necessarily mean “worse”. For example, when a muscle is contracted (such as a muscle cramp caused by sports) it will bruise more easily because the surrounding tissues are located closer to bone.  Thus, a small ankle bruise could be more severe than a large impact on the upper leg that looks worse. As we age, blood vessels and capillaries change over time and become less pliant, expandable and resilient, thus one reason that older people are more prone to bruising.

In order to codify bruises and find the best treatment, medicine uses something called the Harm Scale that rates the severity and medical risks of specific bruising in a specific individual on a scale of 0-5, with 0 being a light bruise and 5 being at risk of death. The score is determine by the injuries caused to organs and tissues, other patient conditions (such as age and medical history), and associated injuries.

While most bruises simply require basic home care, some, such as bone bruises may require a visit to the ER or doctor, especially if the bruise causes extreme pain, swelling or internal pressure.

Light Bruises are generally the most common and are the kind that Bruise Relief brand products provide the best results for in most cases.  However, moderate to severe bruises can be dangerous! Why?

If the bruise is severe, bleeding and excess fluid may accumulate causing a hard, fluctuating lump or swelling hematoma, which can lead to compartment syndrome where blood is cut off from the tissues leading to weakness, numbness and/or intense pressure – surgery is often the required method for treatment. Bruising trauma can also harm internal organs. For example, blunt trauma to the head can lead to traumatic brain injury, a concussion, coma or even death. Once again, surgery is often the required method for treatment of this sever situation.

The effects of bruising can also cause or increase other damage to the body including strained muscles or tendons. What at first might initially appear as simply bruising may turn more severe, especially if not initially treated. If you experience difficulty in moving, numbness, deep internal pressure or feel liquid under the skin of your bruise, it is a good idea to seek medical help.

Coming next in Part 3 of our series: Some causes of bruising and why some are more predisposed to bruising.

Photos: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hematoma

Part 1: An Introduction to Bruising
Part 2: Contusions vs. Ecchymoses – The Different Types of Bruises
Part 3: Common Myths about Bruising
Part 4: Why Some People are More Predisposed to Bruising?
Part 5: Bruising Treatments

Part 1:  AN INTRODUCTION TO BRUISING
We’ve all experienced them at some point: sports injuries, post-medical procedures, and even everyday accidents cause them, but how many of us really understand what Bruising is and the science behind it? So whether it’s a few little unsightly black and blue dings from water-skiing, or a whallop of a purple and yellow plate sized bruise caused by a biking accident, bruises can range from the mildly annoying to the downright dangerous. Understanding what bruising is can help understand how to better treat them. Most people don’t realize this, but in many cases, there are ways to reduce bruising and even speed along their recovery.

What is Bruising anyway?

The two most used medical terms are contusions and ecchymoses. Contusions which are injuries to the skin or “lower” tissue that cause tiny blood vessels or capillaries to be damaged or broken. The immediate reaction is a reddish color, and then bruises typically turn bluish or purple after a day or two. The discoloration and raising of the skin in bruises is the result of blood seeping from injured vessels into the surrounding tissues. Bruises can occur at the level of skin, subcutaneous tissues, muscles, or in severe cases, bones. When these tissues are distressed, as in an impact injury, it can cause capillaries to break and blood to escape and build up or “pool”. This blood seeps into surrounding tissues and subcutaneous skin, where the bruise then develops by becoming dark and spreading outward.  Although some minor bruises are painless, especially those on thick areas of the body such as buttocks or thighs, even small minor bruises on tender areas and areas close to bone or nerve endings such as hands or ankles can be painful.

But the body has a funny and fascinating way of protecting itself.  When the capillaries or blood vessels are damaged, the body releases a hormone called endothelin that causes the blood vessels to narrow and minimize bleeding. As the endothelin hormone diminishes after release, normal clotting factors called the von Willebrand factor, initiates coagulation and clotting. This plugs the bleeding which allows the tissue to restore itself to normal conditions.
So, why all the discoloration?

While the body is repairing itself as described above, bruises – especially larger bruises – tend to change color. This discoloration happens because of the breakdown of hemoglobin that escapes from red blood cells to the outside.

Bruises can be dramatic! Starting with a reddish color, blues, purples, greens and yellows are all common colors of what can take weeks to clear up. These colors are caused by something called phagocytosis, which in essence is the escaped blood breaking down and mixing with other components in the body – specifically biliverdin, bilirubin, and hemosiderin. While the hemoglobin (blood) produces the red-blue color in bruises, biliverdin produces a green tint, bilirubin yellow, and hemosideran a golden brown. Over time, as these components in the body begin to break down the released blood, most bruises will diminish then disappear in a matter of several days to 3 weeks. In many cases, the underlying tissue has already healed and what you are seeing are just the remnants from the injury.
Bruises may be something we have all experienced, but we don’t need to take them for granted. While most of them are not life threatening, those with existing medical conditions – those with compromised immune systems or clotting disorders for example, they can add complications and e to existing medical problems, slow down general healing, and exaggerate other medical problems. For most of us however, bruises may not be life threatening, but they can be painful, unsightly, and annoying. Understanding bruising is the first step in knowing how to best treat them.
If you find this information beneficial, follow the additional releases on our blog, and click here to learn more about how Bruise Relief ® products work.

This summer, Woman’s World magazine contacted Bruise Relief™ about offering a coupon to their readers. We were delighted to offer a discount INCLUDING three free travel size samples to women across the county. We know you all have friends, spouses, children and parents who can benefit from Bruise Relief.  We’ll continue to offer this discount through September 1st to our blog readers, twitter followers and loyal fans. If you haven’t tried Bruise Relief, now is your chance!

Get 30% off the retail price with three free travel samples included. Pass the samples along or keep them all to yourself. We won’t say a word.

Shop online at our website and enter this code to receive your discount BRWW2010

Following a recent sailing excursion, Bruise Relief’s fearless leader learned that her husband was not “in the know” about all things Bruise Relief.  When her husband took a rather painful whack to the wrist, almost immediately, an ugly 4-inch blue and purple bruise began to form. When Barbara offered her husband some gauze bandage along with the Bruise Relief, he questioned the need for gauze. 

 What? How can this be? Apparently, he had never heard about the gauze /Bruise Relief combination. Barbara explained.

For severe cases, gauze can really help in the recovery process.

First, apply Bruise Relief to the area as soon as possible.  Secondly, secure a piece of gauze to the area so the Bruise Relief stays on and can be absorbed into the skin.

Armed with this new bit of knowledge, Barbara’s husband applied Bruise Relief and gauze to the large purplish bruise. The next day, the bruise was gone. Vanished.  

Get “in the know”, try the Bruise Relief and gauze combo.

It does the trick!

Sorry for being so skeptical re: Bruise Relief but your explanation does make ingenious sense. It is similar to what we see in “compartment syndrom ” or tamponade wherein one fluid or solution competes for and takes over a “space” not allowing the other. Your ingredients are competing for the intestitial space with the extravasated blood.

Here’s what that means for you Bruise Relief® lovers out there:

Compartment syndrome and tamponade are both terms that refer to the compression of blood vessels. Bruise Relief®, when applied shortly after trauma, is acting as the compressor that prevents blood and fluids from pooling and bruises from appearing. 

When we experience trauma to the skin, whether from injury, surgery or other causes, blood and fluids are forced out into the surrounding tissue. This process causes bruising. 

Bruise Relief® combats bruising in two ways. First, the ingredients in Bruise Relief® (Distilled water, Glycerin, Vitamin E Oil, Evening Primrose Oil and Carbomer) when applied shortly after impact or cosmetic procedure, are absorbed quickly into the skin and immediately begin preventing blood from filling in the impacted area. Second, Bruise Relief® will help prevent or lessen any further bleeding.

Instead of a bruise forming, the blood and fluids that cause bruising are reabsorbed into the skin effectively preventing or diminishing the appearance of a bruise.

See Bruise Relief really is ingenious!

Many times we injure ourselves as the result of being on the go, hurrying to make the bed or rushing to get to work. As we’ve said before, Bruise Relief® is most effective when applied shortly after impact. Here’s some advice for busy people:

• First, keep Bruise Relief® handy so that when you’re injured, you can reach for relief.
• Second, an easy way to use Bruise Relief® on the go is to apply to the injury and then cover with a gauze strip.

Using the gauze strip over  Bruise Relief® will keep the gel or serum on the point of impact so its not wiped away by clothing or movement.

Keep those questions and comments coming!

Out policy is to never divulge private information, so we are anonymously posting some of the great comments received so far. Here are just a few:

“Happy to find out about this product. Thank you for the chance to try it.”

“I bruise very easily and would love to try.”

“I would really like to try a sample of BRUISE RELIEF, because my husband is a dialysis patient.”

“I look forward to spreading the word if I like your product.”

“I will be happy to receive this amazing product!”

HH: Bruise Relief is a remedy for what?

BC: It’s my great-grandmother’s remedy. A remedy for bruises. It gets bruises to go away much more quickly. And in fact, if you use it pretty quickly after something happens, the bruise won’t even happen. That’s the WOW experience from the skeptics who try it.

HH: For generations your family has been using Bruise Relief and then along comes Katrina.

BC: We experienced Katrina as everyone else did. Then a year after Katrina we went back to our lives. We realized we had an opportunity with Bruise Relief, to bring something creative and useful to the market, to our local community as well as to everyone.

HH: Now Barbara, in the aftermath of that chaos, how long did it take you to say, “It’s time to take the home remedy that is now Bruise Relief to market?” By the way this is in every major pharmacy in the United States now. You can look at it on the web at BruiseRelief.com. It’s a huge success.

BC: I can honestly say it absolutely was almost  a year. Nobody who went through what we went through was thinking clearly for eight, nine, ten, twelve months.  As much as last week, I ran into someone whose family was just moving back into her house. That’s our reality down here.

HH: When did you decide you were going to make a business out of Bruise Relief?

BC: I guess it would have to be December of 2006. That’s when I absolutely decided I was going to focus full-time on our business.

HH: How successful is Bruise Relief?

BC: Bruise Relief is amazingly successful. And our reality is we’re presenting a new claim, a new product into a market that didn’t exist before. If you went into your pharmacist with a bruise, they would say ice or two weeks. We have a new claim, a new reality and something that demographically is growing. It’s safe for all ages. Our family used it for pediatrics but seniors who are living longer, more active lives, tend to bruise more easily.

HH: Now it’s in Target, it’s in CVS…

BC: It’s in Target.com. It’s in CVS nationwide in the pharmacies. It’s in Walgreens regionally and growing. It’s on a lot of websites. And we get a tremendous amount of feedback from people who want to try it. We give free samples away. And then they come back and they buy it because it works. The easy part is that it works.

HH: What’s your feeling about the City of New Orleans and its future?

BC: You know New Orleans is a very different place than it used to be. There’s a lot of thing we don’t have which is sad and some days a bit overwhelming. But there’s a lot that is really new and exciting and innovative. You’ve had people talking about it all week. I’d like to say New Orleans has a few more ingredients in our gumbo.

You know America is a melting pot but New Orleans is a gumbo and we’ve got some great new ingredients because we have innovation and entrepreneurship abounding here now.

HH: Well one of those is Bruise Relief and my hat is off to you.