Do You Bruise Easily? When to Get It Checked Out

You might not recognize how much you drink or how many problems in your life are related to alcohol use. Listen to relatives, friends or co-workers when they ask you to examine your drinking habits or to seek help. Consider talking with someone who has had a problem with drinking but has stopped. Alcohol use disorder can include periods of being drunk (alcohol intoxication) and symptoms of withdrawal. Unfortunately, once a bruise has formed, not much can be done to treat it. Most bruises eventually disappear as the body reabsorbs the blood, although healing might take longer as you age.

You may want to massage the sore spot when you’re resting, but it’s a bad idea. You may break more blood vessels under the skin and make the bruised area larger. You may have seen people in old movies or cartoons putting raw steaks on their bruises — especially on black eyes. It’s not safe to handle raw meat or place it against your eye or another body part, since it may be loaded with bacteria. Steaks and other raw meats don’t have special healing powers that can help a bruise.

Do older adults bruise more easily?

But if liver cirrhosis is diagnosed early and the underlying cause is treated, further damage can be limited. Your pain should begin to subside about 3 days after you were bruised. In the meantime, if the bruise really hurts or is swollen, you can take over-the-counter drugs to relieve your pain. NSAIDs, such as ibuprofen or naproxen can be used, though there is a slight increase in bleeding especially in elderly patients or in those already on a blood thinner. However, in some cases, such as psoriasis and rosacea, a person will need to continue treatment even after they have stopped drinking alcohol.

Abstinence can reverse many of alcohol’s effects on hematopoiesis and blood cell functioning. Alcohol is the most commonly used drug whose consequences include the suppression of blood cell production, or hematopoiesis. In addition to interfering with the proper absorption of iron into the hemoglobin molecules of red blood cells (RBC’s), alcohol use can lead to either iron deficiency or excessively high levels of iron in the body. Because iron is essential to RBC functioning, iron deficiency, which is commonly caused by excessive blood loss, can result in anemia.

Risk factors

Having a mild intolerance to alcohol or something else in alcoholic beverages might not require a trip to a doctor. Simply avoid alcohol, limit how much you drink or avoid certain types of alcoholic beverages. By Heidi Moawad, MD

Heidi Moawad is a neurologist and expert in the field of brain health and neurological disorders. Dr. Moawad regularly writes and edits health and career content for medical books and publications. Alcohol also alters the function of the stomach, liver, and kidneys in ways that prevent the body from properly detoxifying waste material, which then builds up and harms many regions of the body, including the nerves.

• These effects are temporary, and a person can notice them the day after a night of drinking, whether or not they have AUD.
• The early signs of alcoholic liver disease are vague and affect a range of systems in the body.
• Since nutritional deficiencies are partly to blame for alcoholic neuropathy, supplementation with vitamin B12, folate, vitamin E, and thiamine may be recommended.
• If a loved one has a bruise that can’t be explained, particularly in an unusual location such as on the face, be aware of the possibility of abuse.

About 2% of American adults have liver disease, and therefore are at risk of developing cirrhosis. However, those who drink too much alcohol, those alcohol and bruising who are overweight and those with viral hepatitis are at a greater risk. A wide range of other conditions and diseases can cause cirrhosis as well.