Hemorrhoids treatment

Hemorrhoids treatment depends on when a patient sees a doctor. The clot can be removed with an almost painless nonsurgical office procedure if the patient sees a doctor within a day or two of first feeling the discomfort.

If the patient waits three or more days, hemorrhoids treatment will resolve the discomfort, but relief may take up to a week. Nonsurgical treatments include:

• Resting in bed with the legs elevated
• Hydrocortisone creams
• Warm sitz baths

Most hemorrhoids can be treated with simple changes to diet and bowel habits. Most do not require surgery or other treatment unless the hemorrhoids are very large and painful.

The goal of nonsurgical procedures used to treat hemorrhoids, called fixative procedures, is to reduce the blood supply to the hemorrhoid so it shrinks or withers away. The scar tissue left in its place helps support the anal tissue and helps prevent more hemorrhoids from developing.

Fixative procedures include tying off the hemorrhoids with a rubber band (rubber band ligation); using heat, laser, or electric current to create scar tissue (coagulation therapy); or injecting chemicals to shrink the tissue (injection sclerotherapy).

Surgical removal of hemorrhoids (hemorrhoidectomy) can be used for large internal hemorrhoids, when several small hemorrhoids are present, or when other treatments have not controlled bleeding. Sometimes a combination of treatments (for example, a fixative procedure and a hemorrhoidectomy) is the most effective way to treat hemorrhoids.