What causes your legs to swell and leak fluid? (2023)

Is fluid leaking from legs serious?

A leaking leg is a serious health concern. If you haven't sought medical care, you should schedule an appointment with your physician. Your physician might diagnose you with edema or perform additional testing to rule out conditions such as liver and kidney disease.

Weeping legs is a term used to describe fluid leaking from your legs, often from swelling or a wound. While swelling and wounds are the primary cause behind this weeping, several underlying conditions, like diabetes, can cause those wounds or sores and lead to this problem.

Common treatments for leg swelling include walking daily, elevation of the legs throughout the day and at night, compression stockings and sleeves, compression pumps, wrapping the legs to reduce swelling, and use of water pills or diuretics in consultation with your primary care doctor and cardiologist.

Extreme swelling, often in the feet, ankles and legs, can lead to skin ulcers (wounds), weeping edema and dangerous skin infections like cellulitis. Family caregivers who suspect edema should address the concern immediately with a physician.

Sometimes edema is the first sign of heart failure. Once heart failure is diagnosed, it becomes important to monitor increases in body weight that may result from increased fluid retention. One 2021 review of studies suggests that increases in edema may also predict worsening heart failure.

Right side failure causes fluid to back up in the veins and capillaries in your body. This backup can cause pressure on the capillaries and fluid seeps out into the tissue causing swelling and even “weeping” of tissue, especially in the legs and feet.

Though it might seem counterintuitive, getting enough fluids actually helps reduce swelling. When your body isn't hydrated enough, it holds onto the fluid it does have. This contributes to swelling.

Although prescription medications and creams can treat edema, it is essential to drink enough water. When your body is not hydrated enough, it holds onto the fluid it already has to make up for the lack of incoming water, thus contributing to swelling.

Can weeping legs be cured?

When treating excessive lower extremity drainage due to edema, complete decongestive therapy can go a long way to resolve a “weepy leg.” The management of excessive lower extremity drainage is often difficult.

Oedema can happen if someone has a specific condition, like chronic heart failure, kidney failure, or liver disease. But it can happen to any patient at the end of their life as their body begins to shut down.

Medications, pregnancy, infections, and many other medical problems can cause edema. Edema happens when your small blood vessels leak fluid into nearby tissues. That extra fluid builds up, which makes the tissue swell. It can happen almost anywhere in the body.

Swelling (edema) in your lower legs is another sign of a heart problem. When your heart doesn't work as well, blood flow slows and backs up in the veins in your legs. This causes fluid to build up in your tissues. You may also have swelling in your stomach or notice some weight gain.

Shortness of breath with activity or when lying down. Fatigue and weakness. Swelling in the legs, ankles and feet. Rapid or irregular heartbeat.

Patients in the end stages of heart failure want to know what to expect. The symptoms of end-stage congestive heart failure include dyspnea, chronic cough or wheezing, edema, nausea or lack of appetite, a high heart rate, and confusion or impaired thinking.

Congestive heart failure.

Congestive heart failure causes one or both of the heart's lower chambers stop pumping blood well. As a result, blood can back up in the legs, ankles and feet, causing edema. Congestive heart failure can also cause swelling in the stomach area.

Depending on the cause of your diagnosis, edema could be temporary or permanent. Swelling normally lasts for a few days. In the first two days, you will experience the most swelling, and it should start to reduce by the third day.

How do you drain edema fluid naturally?

Common causes of sudden leg swelling

A blood clot blocking blood flow in a large leg vein — also called a DVT, or deep vein thrombosis. An injury such as a broken leg or a pulled leg muscle. An infection in the skin, joint, or other tissue of the leg. Joint inflammation in a joint of the leg, like the knee.

Seek medical care right away if your legs swell for no apparent reason, especially if you have unexplained leg pain, difficulty breathing, chest pain or other warning signs of a blood clot in your lungs or a heart condition. Many factors — varying greatly in severity — can cause leg swelling.

One of the easiest ways to manage swelling is to elevate (raise) the swollen limb. The goal is to elevate the swollen limb slightly above the level of the heart. This helps the extra fluid move back towards the heart for circulation to the rest of the body.

eating too much salty food. being overweight. being pregnant. taking certain medicines – such as some blood pressure medicines, contraceptive pills, hormone therapy, antidepressants or steroids.

Pulse and heartbeat are irregular or hard to feel or hear. Body temperature drops. Skin on their knees, feet, and hands turns a mottled bluish-purple (often in the last 24 hours) Breathing is interrupted by gasping and slows until it stops entirely.

Is there a cure for weeping legs?

When treating excessive lower extremity drainage due to edema, complete decongestive therapy can go a long way to resolve a “weepy leg.” The management of excessive lower extremity drainage is often difficult.

As untreated lymphedema prolongs, it can develop into lymphangiosarcoma – a lymph-related cancer that limits a patient's life expectancy from a few months to two years.

Seek medical care immediately if your edema is suddenly worse, painful, new, or if it's associated with chest pain or trouble breathing. The latter may be a sign of pulmonary edema, a serious medical condition in which the lung cavities fill with fluid.

First, you should clean the area where the fluid is leaking to reduce risk of infection. Then, apply a moisturizing lotion to help heal the skin and protect it from further breakdown. Dress the wound with sterile, absorbent, non-sticky bandages, and then wrap your limb with short-stretch compression bandages.

Depending on the cause of your diagnosis, edema could be temporary or permanent. Swelling normally lasts for a few days. In the first two days, you will experience the most swelling, and it should start to reduce by the third day.

Why does it occur? Disruption to the skin surface such as Insect bites, abrasions, cuts, wounds, or cracks in the skin can enable the lymph fluid to seep out. Other times it can be when the limb is very swollen and tight and there are no other options but to leak out via the skin.

The most common symptom of lymphedema is swelling in one or both arms or legs. This swelling, which can extend into the fingers or toes, usually develops gradually over time. At first, the swelling is soft and fluid. In time, it can become more dense and fibrous, and it may make your skin look grainy.

Lymphedema Causes

Lymphedema occurs as a result of a blockage in the lymphatic system. This is most often caused by a traumatic event, such as sports injuries or deep cuts and bruises, as an aftereffect of surgery or cancer treatment. More rarely, lymphedema can occur as birth defect or symptom of infection.

Stage 1 is early edema, which improves with limb elevation. Stage 2 represents pitting edema that does not resolve with elevation. Stage 3 describes fibroadipose deposition and skin changes. The severity of lymphedema is categorized as mild (<20% increase in extremity volume), moderate (20–40%), or severe (>40%).

What happens if leg edema is left untreated?

If left untreated, edema can lead to increasingly painful swelling, stiffness, difficulty walking, stretched or itchy skin, skin ulcers, scarring, and decreased blood circulation.

When there is a change in the volume of fluid leaking or being reabsorbed, an imbalance occurs, and this may eventually lead to swollen, oedematous legs that can start to leak outside the body.

When to Seek Care for Swelling. You should seek emergency care if you have sudden, unexplained swelling in just one limb or if it occurs along with chest pain, trouble breathing, coughing up blood, fever, or skin that is red and warm to the touch.