Large varicose veins (saphenous and perforating veins) can be treated with traditional stripping or cryo stripping surgery: this technique requires a short-term hospitalisation (12 to 48 hours), and a general or epidural anaesthesia, and very rarely a local anaesthesia. Since it is an open-surgery procedure, it leaves scars. It also requires time off work with a median of 3 weeks.
This surgical technique gives short-term results similar to EVLT but is less effective in the long term, with along the same vein in between 30% and 50% of cases at 5 years depending on case studies.
 
Other surgical techniques do exist but are used less frequently (, sometimes combined with a , isolated crossectomy).
  

• Radiofrequency or Closure® is close to EVLT in its technique (endovenous thermal burning resulting from a temperature increase similar to EVLT), in its aim (obtaining a definitive
  fibrosis
  of the varicose vein), and in its results (no or few recanalizations in the long term). The technique is also performed under local anaesthesia by
  tumescence
  , and leaves no scar. The after effects are fairly similar to those of EVLT and side effects are identical. However, the procedure is equally long or longer, rather more expensive and, above all, it does not provide as many therapeutic possibilities as EVLT (treatment of varicose veins of small or very large diameter, tortuous varicose veins, and shorter segments such as
  perforating veins
  ).
  Like EVLT, radiofrequency has been practised since the late 90s. The latest technique, Closure® Fast, does not use radiofrequency as a heat source and has not been practised for as long as EVLT.
• Foam sclerotherapy aims to chemically burn the
  tunica intima
  in order to reduce the diameter of the varicose vein and obtain its complete fibrosis. It consists in injecting a sclerosing substance in the form of foam under ultrasound guidance. It is performed in at the doctor's office, without hospitalisation, without incision and therefore without scar, and without time off work. It can require several
  outpatient sessions.
  It is not very expensive and has side effects similar to EVLT or Closure® but often of a shorter duration.
  Its effectiveness in a first-line treatment of saphenous veins (as an alternative to surgery, laser or Closure®) is less effective in terms of immediate as well as long-term results at 5 years with frequent recanalizations. However, this technique gives excellent results as a second-line treatment, that is to say as a complement to EVLT, surgery or Closure®. During an annual
  phlebologic
  check-up, this technique allows laser or surgical revisions to be avoided in already treated areas in the vast majority of cases.
• An endovenous technique using water steam, with the same aim as the endovenous laser (thermal burning), is a very recent development and is currently under evaluation.

• Venotonics are analgesic drugs that do not cure venous disease and its consequences. At most, they can reduce the symptoms felt (heaviness, pain,
  restless legs syndrome
  ,
  paresthesia
  ).
• Compression tights, stockings or bands limit and ease the development of symptoms, like venotonics. Contention probably limits the evolution of venous disease but, like venotonics, it does not prevent long-term complications and in particular skin disorders.