Perferated Ear

[jackiemize]

During my o\w at Lake travis, I had trouble equalizing my left ear on the second 30 foot dive. At 25 feet as I was trying to equalize my ears, I felt bubbles coming from my left ear. It did not hurt at all. A few seconds later I felt water go inside my ear and instantly I lost my orientaion. I became dizzy to the point my instructor had to get me to the surface. After a few minutes I went back down to 30 feet finshed the days tests and fed the fish..No pain but still very dizzy and I could feel water in my ear. At the hotel that night I could hold my nose and blow air out of my ear. My hearing is fine.. The doctor I went to told me I had a pereferated ear(not sure how to spell it). He said the ear would heal fine in a couple of weeks but did not recommend any more scuba diving. He admitted he was not used to this type of injury and to seek others advice. My instructor wants to be certain before he lets me finish o\w that it will be o.k.
I really want to go diving . Have you heard of this and what do you recommend? Please Help...

 

[scubadoc]

Hi Jackiemize:

Your problems were the end result of inability to equalize the pressures between the outside the ear with the pressures in the middle ear. It is possible that you have some type of blockage of your nasal lining near the opening of your Eustachian tubes, possibly polyps, bony growths, nasal septal deviation or allergic rhinitis.

Occasionally, the cause is never found, although faulty clearing technique is frequently the reason.

If a good ENT exam fails to expose any pathology in the back of your nose, then you might need to check into your diving technique. Descending feet first down the anchor line or a down line is helpful in that you can rise slowly just a foot or two and often take the pressure off and clear easily. Many people are allergic to milk or milk products; avoiding cigarette smoke, diesel fumes, alcohol and any other irritants might be helpful. Here is a site where you may download a set of guidelines for various techniques for clearing.
http://www.scuba-doc.com/download/Equalizing_Techniques.zip

In addition, you can use medications that will help you reduce the swelling around the opening to the Eustachian tubes. Most people use and get good results from oral Sudafed tablets. Afrin nasal spray, for a day or two only also is helpful but can cause troublesome rebound congestion. Taking Sudafed throughout the trip would not be harmful, nor would it cause rebound congestion. The newer antihistamines (Allegra, Claritin and Zyrtec) might be helpful, taken on the advice of your physician. Flonase can also be helpful in some people. We would not advise taking antibiotics unless there is a specific reason (infection).
http://www.scuba-doc.com/entprobs.html

It would not be wise to consider diving until the ear drum has healed - either spontaneously or with a graft. A determination can then be made as to whether or not you can return to diving by a diving oriented ENT physician. One of these can usually be found by contacting the nearest recompression chamber and requesting a referral. You can also call DAN (Divers Alert Network) at 1-919-684-8111.