My friend just got her OW and she's been diagnosed with DCS

[Jim Lapenta]

Thanks for pointing this out. I saw it but needed time to come up with a response that would not get me banned.

 

[DevonDiver]

Not sure if this is mentioned yet, if at this point padi is aware of this type of instruction, either your aow, or your freinds ow will not be legit, or both so in all you now will loose your cert and money.

Do you have any information about students who have 'lost' their certifications due to the failings of their instructors? I've been in the industry for a while and have never heard of this happening...ever. Is it an urban myth that you are pandering?

The other is how much did you two have to drink, and sleep, or even just her. just like they say do not drink the water, how much actual water were you drinking. was there any elevation you went to during your stay.

Dehydration, tiredness etc are pre-disposing factors for DCS. PFO could be an issue also.

But...BIG BUT... this was an Open Water course... and the primary factor contributing to this hit is undoubtably one, or more, rapid ascents. Those ascents should have been prevented by the instructor - who had a duty of care to protect his student... He didn't. She got bent.

And I can clearly say I have been in some sort of bent way, the pain was not enough for me to hit the chamber. I would go for a dive and a long shallow safety and then slowly come up to surface.

I don't think you find any support for ad-hoc 'in-water decompression' amongst the dive medical community...

So if she is not going to chamber, just take her for a dive, and see how she feels in the next few days.

To any novice divers reading this thread...disregard this 'advice'. It is irresponsible in the extreme.

And here in the good ole USA there is no law that says you can not go scubadiving without being certified, or how deep you can go.

Darwin's Law

Any ways when I do multiple dives in tropic water I will do a shallow shore dive in the middle of the dives, usually after the dive day is over.

And you calculate the decompression value of this HOW?!?

 

[tholden1]

I mentioned DAN to her before we left. She never signed up to pay for it.

The shop never mentioned DAN to her that I know of. I don't know if they signed her up for it, but I doubt it.

Just a reminder that, as it has been said several times now, DAN provides free insurance for students, but you have to sign up for it. It is not automatic.

As you can see, she chose not to be covered.

 

[Karibelle]

I've answered my own question, and for anyone who's interested I thought I'd share the following.

I said this:

[/LIST]
I disagree with this point. As PADI allows "indirect supervision" for AOW dives less than 60 feet, I wouldn't have an issue with bringing two students as a buddy pair to do their Fish ID dive (for example) on an OW training dive. It requires some good judgement. I once had an AOW student who had 250 dives on him, and 50 of those were with me present. Would I hesitate to bring him and his wife (already AOW) with me on an OW training dive while he completed some AOW requirements? Not at all.

Got this reply:

The exact PADI standard states:

Quote:
AOW Standards, General — Indirect supervision allowed for dives conducted to 18 metres/60 feet or less. Direct supervision required for dives conducted deeper than 18 metres/60 feet, unless all divers have completed the Deep Adventure Dive.

This means that the AOW divers can be supervised directly by a Qualified Assistant - either another teaching status instructor, AI or a renewed PADI divemaster (not sure how many DMs in some locations ever bother to renew??).

Meanwhile, the OW course demands the direct supervision on a PADI teaching status instructor. This is defined in standards as:

<I snipped the bit about the definition of Direct Supervision>

Basically, it is acceptable for AOW divers to accompany OW divers - but both groups should have independant supervision. The instructor with the OW divers and another instructor/DM with the AOW students (except for Deep dive).

However, the instructor has overall responsibility for the safety of all divers.. and should also ensure that the co-location of two separate training courses does not detract from the quality of training of either of those courses.

I replied asking for clarification from the manual:

Can you point me to this in the manual? that "indirect supervision" requires a certified assistant in a "direct supervision" capacity?

Somewhere near this, I suspect, if it is there:

Indirect Supervision –
a. Dive site: Be present and in control of the activities,
but not necessarily directly supervising all activities.
Approve dive activities, oversee the planning,
preparation, equipment inspections, entries, exits
and debriefings and be prepared to quickly enter the
water.

TIA,
kari

So today I spoke with an educational consultant at PADI on a different matter, and asked this question as well. He confirmed my understanding that "indirect supervision" does not require that a certified assistant is in the water with the divers on their adventure dives, as long as I as the instructor can verify that the performance requirements for the dive are met. In any cases in the AOW course where something other than indirect supervision is required, it is spelled out in each of the individual adventure dives.

So, my Fish ID people could in fact conduct their dive on their own, without me or any other certified assistant in the water.

 

[tholden1]

If this is the case, then what's the point of the AOW certification at all? I've done chartered dives before. Look over my book and send me a card. It all seems a waste then.

As I watched instructors working directly with students on their AOW at Lake Travis Austin and I saw the amount of effort and personal attention they were putting into it, I know that not every instructor just lets the student go off on their own and signs both their log book, and the adventure dive certification when their done.

When I report to PADI, I would be very interested on their input into this. All of my dives were conducted this way except for the navigation portion. Some things mentioned in the adventure dive were skipped. So, if that is the norm, and the intent is to read, go dive, and get a signature then I'll definitely recommend people not waste their money on it.

I almost want to repeat this with the guys I saw in Austin just to see the difference. They seemed so on top of things, very hard core. Of course, then I'd have to dive a lake again which isn't the greatest thing.

But, the fact that you can "instruct" someone without even being a part of the dive by PADI standards bothers me. But again, maybe my expectations are unrealistic.

I've answered my own question, and for anyone who's interested I thought I'd share the following.

I said this:



Got this reply:



I replied asking for clarification from the manual:



So today I spoke with an educational consultant at PADI on a different matter, and asked this question as well. He confirmed my understanding that "indirect supervision" does not require that a certified assistant is in the water with the divers on their adventure dives, as long as I as the instructor can verify that the performance requirements for the dive are met. In any cases in the AOW course where something other than indirect supervision is required, it is spelled out in each of the individual adventure dives.

So, my Fish ID people could in fact conduct their dive on their own, without me or any other certified assistant in the water.

 

[Karibelle]

If this is the case, then what's the point of the AOW certification at all? I've done chartered dives before. Look over my book and send me a card. It all seems a waste then.

As I watched instructors working directly with students on their AOW at Lake Travis Austin and I saw the amount of effort and personal attention they were putting into it, I know that not every instructor just lets the student go off on their own and signs both their log book, and the adventure dive certification when their done.

There are other components to an "Adventure Dive" than just the actual dive itself. "Instruction" covers all of those components. Just because PADI standards allow for "indirect supervision" on dives does not mean that the instructor does not have an obligation to provide the discussion portion of the instruction, brief the dive, debrief the dive and ensure that the performance requirements of the dive are indeed met.

I'm NOT saying that it's appropriate to have students "go off on their own and sign their log book." I am saying that there are differing levels of supervision required during the dives themselves and in some cases, indirect supervision on a dive would not negatively impact a student's experience in their course. Does not mean they would not still receive all the knowledge transfer, Q&A, review, etc.

When I report to PADI, I would be very interested on their input into this. All of my dives were conducted this way except for the navigation portion. Some things mentioned in the adventure dive were skipped. So, if that is the norm, and the intent is to read, go dive, and get a signature then I'll definitely recommend people not waste their money on it.

Please; I encourage you to get PADI's input. Given how long you've been talking about contacting PADI, I'm surprised you haven't done so already. The person I spoke with was LeRoy Wickham, so you might want to ask for him, or you might want to specifically ask for someone else to see if you get a different answer than I did.

I posted this before, but in case you missed it, here's the phone number again, c&p from the PADI website:
Ph: 800 729 7234 (US and Canada)

And BTW, if "some things mentioned in the adventure dive were skipped" then the performance requirements were not met and the instructor did not do his job properly. I am NOT advocating doing a shoddy job. Far from it; what I said was this:

"indirect supervision" does not require that a certified assistant is in the water with the divers on their adventure dives, as long as I as the instructor can verify that the performance requirements for the dive are met.

I almost want to repeat this with the guys I saw in Austin just to see the difference. They seemed so on top of things, very hard core. Of course, then I'd have to dive a lake again which isn't the greatest thing.

But, the fact that you can "instruct" someone without even being a part of the dive by PADI standards bothers me. But again, maybe my expectations are unrealistic.

It's great that the Austin people were so wonderful. I'd like to reiterate that "instruction" includes much more than watching you dive, and in some cases, your educational experience is in no way going to be negatively impacted by not having your instructor three feet away while you conduct your dive.

And a question for you, tholden1: If you have such high expectations of your training, how in the heck did you get yourself into this situation in the first place?

FWIW, I do not think your expectations are unrealistic. I think you've learned a lot through your experience, and the discussions about it here on ScubaBoard. If I ever had a student come and say to me "you know, I learned on ScubaBoard that there are some parts of the AOW course where you don't even have to be in the water with me, and I'm not comfortable with that and require that you personally accompany me on EVERY dive" I'd happily agree.

kari

 

[Bubbletrubble]

Karibelle's comments indicate that PADI standards stipulate different levels of supervision for AOW Adventure dives. Those are set forth as minimum requirements and, as she pointed out, the instructor can choose to exceed those requirements. In my experience, I'd have to say that conscientious teachers will make the choice to exceed requirements in one way or another. And this doesn't necessarily mean that they'll directly supervise the AOW dives that only require indirect supervision. It could come in the form of extra dives, more detailed post-dive debriefings, sharing tips on critter identification, helping with horizontal trim, teaching different propulsion techniques, discussing how to be a good buddy, introducing gas management/planning, etc.

Some of the AOW Adventure dives really do require direct supervision -- the deep and PPB dives come to mind. This makes sense, to me at least, because the deep dive requires feedback on narcosis and entails increased risk, whereas PPB demands that the instructor witness firsthand any deficiencies and make the appropriate major/minor tweaks in real-time. For my AOW nav dive, my instructor remained on the surface and watched our two-man buddy teams swim a pre-defined course by monitoring a surface float. I was OK with that. FWIW, I think PADI's AOW class is really just a way for a diver to get experience doing different kinds of dives (deep, night, boat, wreck, etc.) with some professional supervision, be that direct or indirect.

The unfortunate thing here is that direct supervision may have been the OP's expectation, and the course did not meet that expectation. We can probably fault a lack of communication for this. I can sympathize with the OP, though, because as a student you don't want to come off as "needy" or "high maintenance" to the instructor. I can imagine a moment of awkwardness when the instructor describes the dive to be conducted and informs the student that the instructor won't be accompanying the student. The student has a couple of choices to respond: (1) "But I'd prefer that you be there..." or (2) say nothing and conduct the dive as instructed. I think the onus is on the instructor to explicitly state that the student has the option of the dive being directly or indirectly supervised. Then the ball's in the student's court and there shouldn't be any awkwardness at all. Approaching it in this way should keep both parties happy.

 

[tholden1]

This is somewhat more related to the other thread I posted in, but I got myself in this situation by choosing the wrong shop. I didn't know till I knew, and all the feedback I had saw (including from here) was positive.

The combined deep/wreck adventure dive included one comment from the instructor: "compare your depth guage and dive computer depth to notice the differences." Otherwise, I received no guidance, instruction, and we performed no underwater or above water activities regarding the deep dive. So, I don't know about these things you speak of in regards to the deep dive. He led a group of divers through a standard chartered wreck dive. I was simply one of them, even though I was the one supposed to be on an AOW dive.

And, I haven't contacted PADI yet because my report will be formal, detailed, and long. I've got to sit down and type it all out and then check it before I send it. It'll cover what I saw regarding the new OW student, along with the AOW concerns. I want to take my time with it so it's complete and accurate.

 

[Karibelle]

That's what I thought; that your expectations for your next course will be informed by this discussion. That's a good thing.

Good luck with the report.

-kari

 

[tholden1]

It's good to know that this was required. This wasn't what I got.

I complained a few times so he watched me swim around a five-foot deep pool for 30 minutes and commented on my breathing and buoyancy. In the ocean though, nothing was done during either the deep/wreck, or whatever was supposed to be PPB.

I signed up for AOW and got mainly normal chartered dives, with about 30 minutes of pool work and a few comments on breathing because I complained that I wasn't getting any instruction.

Some of the AOW Adventure dives really do require direct supervision -- the deep and PPB dives come to mind. This makes sense, to me at least, because the deep dive requires feedback on narcosis and entails increased risk, whereas PPB demands that the instructor witness firsthand any deficiencies and make the appropriate major/minor tweaks in real-time. For my AOW nav dive, my instructor remained on the surface and watched our two-man buddy teams swim a pre-defined course by monitoring a surface float. I was OK with that. FWIW, I think PADI's AOW class is really just a way for a diver to get experience doing different kinds of dives (deep, night, boat, wreck, etc.) with some professional supervision, be that direct or