My DCS Incident...

[shadragon]

Did you consider that your ascent rate may have had something to do with it? There is a huge difference between 20 feet per minute and 50 feet per minute. I know a dive instructor who is trying to get PADI to institute a maximum of 30 feet per minute for this very reason. He considers their 60 feet per minute advisory limit of PADI to be way too fast. For this reason, I always keep my ascent rate at the slowest measureable rate of one green bar on my computer. I understand that your ascent rate to the surface is also very important even after your 15-20 foot safety stop.

Absolutely, if you look at the dive profile in my pictures you will see it was a very leisurely ascent. My DC puts my ascent rate in the 20-50 range and I would love to see future models break this down into smaller increments for review after the dive. There is considerable difference between 20 and 50 FPM...

 

[Craig Baumann]

One of the best first hand description I have ever read about the effects of type II decompression sickness (joint pain and nervous system disruption,) was in the book The Last Dive. I got email from the author recently, Bernie Chowdhury and in my reply to him I express thanks for his writing of that book. Though the style of the book was less dramatic and the subject matter crossed lines with the book Shadow Divers, The Last Dive left more of an impression on me for several reasons.

One of those reasons the The Last Dive has always stuck with me, is that toward the end of the book Bernie tells of his own experience with DCS and what a devastating effect it had on him emotionally and physically. Interestingly, he had dived deeply many times on the Andrea Dorea and on other East Coast shipwrecks - as deeply as 240 fsw on air - however the dive that finally bent him was considerably shallower. He infers that a series of episodes of damage may lead up to a final devastating DCS hit, an accumulative effect if you will. He also talks about the permanent damage to nerve endings during such a DCS hit, and how in order to recover from it those nerve endings in many cases have to regenerate and re-grow. Bernie literally had to learn to walk over again through his DCS recovery period.

Bernie Chowdhury eventually went back to technical diving after his DCS experience, however he makes the point toward the end of his book that his belief is, no one who does that many deep dives over a period of time gets away unscathed. It is his belief and a premise which medical science is beginning to support, extreme deep diving has a general degenerative effect, on the nervous system, on the brain and on the body.

Best of luck....

 

[Aqualovr]

yes...great info and well done...it illustrates why it's called "dive theory" and not dive fact... kudos on a very thought provoking and articulate posting, glad you came out the other end alright.

 

[poco]

Thank you so much for your post. I am in the process of combing the internet for information on skin bends. I have recently returned from a dive Holiday in Chuuk(as in yesterday) and found myself bent after the first day of diving. It is astonishing how little information is readily available. I had the misfortune of having a poor education about skin bends combined with a dive leader who felt certain that it was not a real condition or concern ( he referred to it as "minor"), therefore, I did not receive any medical attention until I contacted DAN 50 hours later as I was still symptomatic. I did receive a Table 6 in the Hyperbaric Chamber in Chuuk and felt whole again afterwards.
DAN was awesome, the Chuukese people were wonderful and Larry Bruton of HyperBaric Health was fantastic. What is disconcerting is the dismissal of Skin Bends.
Everyone is my group witnessed the growing red rash across my abdomen that became mottled blue veins. I complained of the itch and tenderness and doctored myself with Benadryl. I complained of a headache and being woken up by my skin crackling on my hips and butt combined with shooting pains. I was disoriented and could not stick my tongue out. I showed members of the group when the rash re-appeared the next night. (I did not dive again after the initial onset of the skin bends.) I complained of nausea and confusion.
It is astonishing to me that 20 humans, myself included, never thought that I was in jeopardy or recognized that I was bent and needed Oxygen or the Chamber.
It was all dismissed as "just skin bends".
I would like to know more about skin bends because I am now aware that it was not minor. I am grateful that I was treated, but should have been treated sooner.

 

[eelpout]

I see that they finally have a chamber that works in Chuuk. In the early 90's my wife had a major DCS 2 hit on that island. They had to scramble a plane from Okinawa to get her to Guam because the chamber in Chuuk was inoperable. I had a DCS 2 hit on the same island in 1996, a nd had to wait for 11 hours before I could get to Guam on a commercial flight.

When my wife had her first DCS experience she was surrounded by dive store owners (FAM trip) so the response was automatic. She also had a couple of medically trained people in her group. They called DAN and monitored her till she was turned over to the medical staff on the plane.

She had a PFO ultrasound test and they did not find one. She had 2 more DCS 2 incidents (Belize & Florida) she backed off on her diving. She and I are Scuba Instructors and own our own dive store.

In the late 90's my wife had an episode where half of her body went numb for 10 seconds. Her doctor had a battery of tests done to see what went wrong. She has blood clotting problems in her family, thus the concern about her episode. One of the tests that was administered was a TEE. During that test they found a large PFO in her heart. We had to make a number od decisions after the results were given to us.

She had the PFO plugged with a device that was being used in Europe and was just approved in the US the year before. After 6 months of non diving my wife logged 67 dives in 6 moths. She hasn't had another DCS incident since then. She logs over 150 dives a year. She just came back from a 3 week stint in Cozumel with 57 dives.

I have had DCS2 on three occasions myself. I do not have a PFO. My hits were considered "undeserved". That is the term used for "we don't know what happened" DCS hits.

I post this history to just underline the importance of being educated yourself. Very few doctors outside of the Hyperbaric Medical Treament community know anything about DCS. Join DAN as an organization, join a diving organization that makes an effort to understand DCS rather than blow it off or ignore it. The reality of DCS is that the Scuba Industry does not want to talk about it too much because it would be a major block for recruitment of new divers. The information that my wife and I have learned in the last 20 years is invaluable for ourselves and our students. We share it so if they (our students) ever have DCS, they would know how to deal with it properly and be able to lead a close to normal life after treatment.

What people know about what happens to a post DCS treatment diver is another story... That part of the scene has been not been talked about too much. Even DAN doesn't know too muc about it.

Jim

 

[shadragon]

I would like to know more about skin bends because I am now aware that it was not minor. I am grateful that I was treated, but should have been treated sooner.

As I discovered there is no such thing as a "minor" case of DCS as without treatment it can become worse. 'Skin Bends' IS the bends...

DAN is indeed awesome. I was not a member at the time (I am now and will be forever), but the quality of the way they treated my case was excellent. I had follow up email and phone interviews with a DAN medic and they got as much information from me as possible.

Every diver should be aware of DCS and other barotrauma symptoms so that they can guide emergency response teams and ER doctors in getting the proper treatment. Also, have the DAN Emergency number on you in an obvious place when you dive just in case you cannot talk for yourself when you surface.