Freaking out about hypothetical DCS

[oldschoolto]

I have been known to drink a gallon of rine wine diving with friends at night on the bottom... I don't recall anyone getting DCS.. So , Well I don't recommend drinking and diving... It's do able... oh.. And relax, your fine...

Jim....

 

[ScubaJill]

When I first started diving, I spent some amount of time Googling symptoms of DCS. Tingling hand! Tingling foot! REALLY tired! Weird pain in my rib cage! Headache!!! I never had DCS. Or if I did, I didn't know it. I wish I had that time I spent on Google back, though.

At some point, I realized that my foot gets tingly on occasion and it's completely unrelated to diving. Headaches? Yup. Get those when I'm on the surface. Weird things that come and go when I'm out of the water? Yup. On a dive trip this summer, my feet started going numb during my dives. Weird, I thought. Rather than immediately going into "SOMETHING IS WRONG" mode, I pulled down the strap holding my foot in place, slid my foot out of the pocket a little, and voila! feeling came rushing back. Had I experienced that in my first 10-30 dives? I likely would not have handled the issue with grace. Once I got out of the water, I would have spent a lot of time on the Internets. I would not have been satisfied with the first 30 pages of Google results. Even if those 30 pages of results all came back with "not a thing to worry about," I would've found the one result that presented anecdotal evidence that "numb feet AND diving" meant DCS and ultimately led to the infection and the loss of this (imaginary) person's foot. And, then I would've read the next 60 pages of Google results.

Anyway, that's probably more insight into ScubaJill's mental workings than you wanted. My ultimate point: it's a continuous learning curve. Don't psych yourself out too much.

 

[Bob DBF]

I'm old, I take an inventory of my aches and pains before I hit the water, I know what aches I usually pick up while diving and at the end of the dive I sort out what might be a real problem.

The one time I was bent I had no doubt in my mind that I just f'd up good and went on to resolve the situation. That was once in over 50 years of diving, and was in what they now call would call a technical dive. Never had an issue within Rec (NDL) diving.

There is a medical issue which you can google "PFO ScubaBoard", it can make you more susceptible to DCS, so you might check that out if you feel it might be an issue. Sometimes feelings can lead you in the right direction, they have saved my a** on a number of occasions.


Bob
-----------------------
I may be old, but I'm not dead yet.

 

[gr8jab]

• Joint pain.
• Dizziness.
• Headache.
• Difficulty thinking clearly.
• Extreme fatigue.
• Tingling or numbness.
• Weakness in arms or legs.
• A skin rash.

Any given week, without diving, I have many of these symptoms. It's called getting old...

 

[lowviz]

...//... Do you / did you ever have the same worries about DCS? If yes, how do you solve it?

Don't ever, ever, ever hold your breath. That WILL hurt you and damn fast.

Dive a single tank. Bet you can't ever manage unrepairable DCS on a single unless you have a PFO. Slowly extend your range and if you rash under "my computer says that this is OK" conditions, then you are in that certain percentage who are off the charts.

 

[tbone1004]

@Noemi I think someone said it above, but I would HIGHLY recommend taking at least a DP course if you can, preferably AN/DP, and then reading up on the wonderful books on the subject, below is a pretty good article. A huge part of what you said about "be careful or DCS" is something that shouldn't be harped on and taking a deco procedures course may be enough to alleviate that concern in your head. violating NDL's isn't some scary menacing event that will instantly cause you the bends, the NDL's aren't even a fixed value, just a rough guess. Read up on how we believe decompression works, it may give you a good enough understanding to help remove that unfortunate stigma your instructor put your head.
Decompression Theory – Part 1 | SDI | TDI | ERDI
Decompression Theory – Part 2 | SDI | TDI | ERDI

 

[Noemi]

Thank you everybody for your replies. I am reading more about decompression theory, got the Deco for Divers book and already feeling much more relaxed about DCS. Will still be doing my best to avoid it, but don't feel as worried as before.

 

[Steve_C]

Just to add, that DCS hits in rec diving are not only extremely rare and then when they occur they are usually easily taken care of. I have dove with a number of folks with a lots of dives so the total number is several thousand. I know one person, an older female DM with several hundred dives who got a hit following a series of deep rec dives on offshore ledges. Like 100 ft+. Never life threatening. A chamber session and she was fine. Just had to not dive for a few months.

 

[beester]

I think reading up on DCS and deco in general is very very good. You'll get an idea of what matters and what not, and will understand that a lot concerning deco theory and DCS is grey area and not totally understood. It's a mix of physics, biology and chemistry in individual bodies which make it very hard to pinpoint or program a 100% risk free model.

I've seen a young girl (who was later diagnosed with a very big ASD/PFO) getting a massive dcs hit (type 2) after a 60 ft dive, but I've also seen someone coming out of the water skipping +20' deco without any symptoms (me).This year I've seen 2 DCS hits. Both after tech dives (50-60m range with about 40-50' deco). 1 was very unlucky and lost 80% of hearing in his right ear and was after diagnosed with a big PFO and will stop tech diving. The other after a similar dive with pain in his left shoulder, which seized after breathing O². He elected not to go to a chamber and just breathed O² for 2 hours and took pain medication. Symptoms were gone after 2 hours. Both were diving a profile which is quite conservative.

However you can assure yourself that this sport, although not 100% riskfree is from DCS point of view very safe. I remember reading a dan report stating that the instance of DCS in recreational NDL dives is in the range of 3-5 per 10 000 dives. For technical diving it goes up to 3 per 1000 in the normoxic range and 3-5 per 100 in the full trimix (+80m range). So this means that if you keep to recreational diving chances are very very big that you'll never encounter a DCS hit in your diving career.

By reading up and getting some classes you'll see that by following a model / computer, but also by recognising their limits (yoyo, repeated dives, etc) you'll be pretty safe.

Finally what was already mentioned and is very good advice. I see a lot of divers (even very experienced divers) getting fuzzy about DCS. Because many of the symptoms are very cloudy. Flue like symptoms, are they from dcs or me being very tired and dehydrated, pain in my knee is it from dcs or a knock getting up the boats ladder... So don't get panicked when you feel something, if it's very painful (above 7 on the pain scale) you can be quite sure, same with neurological symptoms. But if that's not the case, in many cases it won't be DCS. Have the victim breath O² (don't administer yourself in the US) and if the symptoms abide and return after no longer breathing O² there is a chance it's a hit. If not, it probably isn't. Of course no harm in consulting a dive medic or contacting DAN if you are a member.