An Australian woman has been labelled a “fashion victim” by a neurologist after she collapsed and had to be cut out of skinny jeans that cut off her blood supply.
The 35-year-old collapsed in a park, unable to walk, and crawled to a cab which took her to hospital.
"When she arrived she had massive swelling of her calf muscles, they had to actually cut the jeans from her, they weren't able to remove them any other way," said consultant neurologist Thomas Kimber.
“When she got up that morning she decided to wear skinny jeans. She noticed they were somewhat tight, but I guess skinny jeans tend to be. She spent all that day really squatting down to help her relatives clean out cupboards.
“She noticed that her legs were becoming increasingly uncomfortable as the day went on [but] didn’t really think much of it,” he told ABC radio.
The unnamed woman later went to a park.
“When she went for a walk she noticed she was tripping; her feet became increasingly weak to the point where she fell,” Prof Kimber said.
"By this time it was dark and quite late at night and she was unable to stand up again, and really was there for some time before she could crawl to the side of the road, hail a cab and bring herself to the Royal Adelaide Hospital. "
A combination of prolonged squatting and wearing extra tight jeans resulted in the blood supply to her calf muscles being cut off. “[Her calf muscles] had become massively swollen, and as a result of that she had suffered compression to two of the major nerves in her lower leg and had developed this leg weakness as a result,” Prof Kimber said.
The woman spent four days in hospital recovering on an intravenous drip.
“She had quite severe ankle and foot weakness for several days and she’d suffered quite significant calf muscle injury and, as a result of that, some proteins are released into her blood stream and she needed to be on an intravenous drip to flush those proteins through so that she wouldn’t develop any damage to her kidneys,” he said.
“Fortunately by day four she was able to be discharged, and she still had some residual ankle and foot weakness but I understand that subsequently she has made a full recovery.”
Prof Kimber said people should consider whether the clothes they wear are suited to tasks they have planned.
“The take home message I would like to leave people is if they are going to doing a lot of squatting ... wear something looser, with more elasticity perhaps,” he said.
“Certainly if you’re squatting in skinny jeans for whatever reason and your legs feel uncomfortable or tingly, you should stand up and walk around to get the blood pumping again.”
Prof Kimber said the woman had been a “fashion victim”.
