MookieMoose:OK, here's the simple version of what happens, from a physiologic standpoint. As previously mentioned, what gas forms an embolism is irrelavent, WHERE the bubble goes is what is important. in the case of DCS bubbles form almoast exculsively in teh venous circulation becuase the gas that forms them is comming out of tissue like muscle, or fat, and blood leaving these tissues enters the venous circulation. The lungs are pretty good at filtering out most bubbles - up to a point. DCS happens when the bubble load in your venous circulation either exceeds the lungs ability to filter, or the bubbles find another way into arteries. Once in the arterial circulation bubbles are forced into ever smaller vessels, ultimately into capillaries where gas exchage with tissues takes place. Sometimes bubbles get stuck here, but not usually. What happens is the bubbles change shape so they can fit through the small capillaries - you end up with thin, VERY long bubbles that interupt the oxygen and nutirient supply of vulnerable tissues like nerves for such a long period (becuase the bubble is so long) that the tissue begins to starve and suffocate (sort-of).
I'll try to attach a picture here to explai things a little better. If this works, it is a photo of blood vessels in the retina of the eye. All the bright white areas are bubbles
OK, I have th photo in a powerpoint slide. I'll try to post it as a jpeg when I get to a computer that can convert it to jpeg format.
Cam
Thank you for this - very informative. I have attatched the picture as a JPEG incase anybody else wanted to take a quick look !
Thanks again,
tristan