One More Ear Question!! <Sorry>

[diverLaurie]

While my husband and I were visiting the islands we took a resort diving course, when we did our open water dive he had some bleeding in his mask and had a huge problem with his ears. Last weekend we were doing our open water certification dives and on the last dive, he had to abort because he was feeling such tremendous pressure and pain in his ear. We went all through the class and pool classes and he never had a problem in the pool, it seems when he goes below a certain depth, his ears start to bother him very badly. Any info on why this is happening or better yet...any ideas on how to make it stop? It might be a good time to mention, he has an appointment with an ENT for later this week. Please give us good news and don't tell me he may have to give up diving, this would not be a good option for either of us as we both really love the sport.

Thanks for any and all hints, theories, suggestions and just plan old well wishes in advance.

Laurie~~

 

[large_diver]

Laurie,

DISCLAIMER -- I am not a doctor.

I guess some questions are in order. The main one is whether he was able to equalize effectively at all during his dives. If he was experiencing ear pain, this indicates that his descent rate was outpacing his equalization and/or that his innards didn't allow him to equalize (head cold perhaps?). Normal procedure would be to ascend until the pain subsides and then re-trying the equalization through a valsalva maneuver or other means.

Ear pain on early dives is something many divers experience, especially if they are doing a desent from the surface to 25+ feet for the first time (vs. a more gradual descent on a shore dive). It could be he just went down too fast. I experienced this on my last checkout dive (35 feet) -- went too far too fast without equalizing. I ascended slightly and was able to equalize and then went down to 35ft with no pain. The next day my ears felt like they were ringing and "full". A trip to the doctor revealed everything was OK -- just some slight redness/swelling from the pressure. 2 weeks of non-diving and I was fine.

Bottom line -- a visit to the ENT is a good idea. Pain isn't necessary an indicator that he can never dive again, but a visit to the doc sounds like it is warranted before he tries diving again.

Good luck -- hope everyhing works out for the hubby.