Those health forms -- Truth or Consequences?

[Mike Boswell]

If you have a dive "incident" it could have a huge impact on the dive operation, their reputation, their staff, and their other customers. People could get hurt or killed trying to help you.

So lets re-phrase your question: Is it okay to place others at risk without their knowledge and consent?

 

[lulubelle]

While a lower resting heart rate is a pretty common side effect of gaining aerobic fitness, there is little proof of any significant health or performance benefit asociated with a lower heart rate. People tend to marvel at an elite athlete with a 30bpm, there are just as many elite athlete in the 50 and 60 bpm range.

There is actually a medical term for this. It is called athletic heart syndrome which is a enlarged heart from copius amounts of excercising of the heart.

Even elite athletes could very well have medical conditions that could affect ones dive medical questionare. I am in pretty descent shape and I had a broken ear drum, along with some recent degenertive knee (from years of running) deteriotation.

Good point, you are correct. Anything too far outside the realm of normal can be a problem in certain situations. For instance, if someone has a very low blood pressure, an athlete with a very low heart rate might not be able to mount a heart rate response to try to compensate for it. I was mighty happy that my heart rate was able to get up into the 140s when my blood pressure was 65/34. Saved my tookus.

 

[lulubelle]

If you have a dive "incident" it could have a huge impact on the dive operation, their reputation, their staff, and their other customers. People could get hurt or killed trying to help you.

So lets re-phrase your question: Is it okay to place others at risk without their knowledge and consent?

Seems that the point most people are trying to make is that if they have a well controlled health issue that has no potential to cause a problem while diving and have been cleared to dive, that they don't care to make everyone's life difficult by disclosing it. I don't, and won't.

I would agree that if you have a well controlled health problem that COULD become a problem in the context of diving, you should disclose this on your medical form.

 

[RJP]

Seems that the point most people are trying to make is that if they have a well controlled health issue that has no potential to cause a problem while diving and have been cleared to dive, that they don't care to make everyone's life difficult by disclosing it. I don't, and won't.

I would agree that if you have a well controlled health problem that COULD become a problem in the context of diving, you should disclose this on your medical form.

One of the things that I find funny is the number of people who don't want to disclose a health issue "to someone who has no medical training" who are perfectly comfortable with their OWN lack of medical training to determine that their medical issue has "no potential to cause a problem."

Trust me, putting my life at risk by having me jump off a boat in the middle of the ocean to save some idiot's @ss will make my life - and their's - much more difficult than if they had been honest on the form in the first place.

If you think rolling a body over in the water, immediately realizing the person is gone when you see that they are blue with pink foam coming from their mouth and nose, towing their lifeless body back to the boat, having five people struggle to pull the body up onto the deck, waiting for what seems like hours for the Coast Guard chopper, loading them into a basket lowered to the deck of a boat that is moving through 4' seas at 10kts, crossing your fingers as they're hoisted up, and never seeing them again, is NOT DIFFICULT...but getting a medical form signed by a doctor IS...I suggest you think the whole thing through again.

 

[AbyssalPlains]

This whole health form signing business is a purely American thing and has everything to do with liability and nothing with common sense. If it was truly about determining whether an individual was fit to dive, they would make every diver to get checked by a physician regularly. I am not aware of any medical condition that I have, but even if I did, I would still check "No" on every question without bothering to read it. It's a formality, nothing more.

 

[RJP]

This whole health form signing business is a purely American thing and has everything to do with liability and nothing with common sense. If it was truly about determining whether an individual was fit to dive, they would make every diver to get checked by a physician regularly. I am not aware of any medical condition that I have, but even if I did, I would still check "No" on every question without bothering to read it. It's a formality, nothing more.

Please inform the crew, so that we can treat any potential rescue of you as "a formality, nothing more."

 

[Sas]

One of the things that I find funny is the number of people who don't want to disclose a health issue "to some idiot who has no medical training" is perfectly comfortable with their OWN lack of medical training to determine that their medical issue has "no potential to cause a problem."

Trust me, putting my life at risk by having me jump off a boat in the middle of the ocean to save some idiot's @ss will make my life - and their's - much more difficult than if they had been honest on the form in the first place.

If you think rolling a body over in the water, realizing the person is gone, towing their lifeless body back to the boat, having five people struggle to pull the body up onto the deck, waiting for what seems like hours for the Coast Guard chopper, loading them into a hoist basket while moving at 10kts, crossing your fingers as they're hoisted up, and never seeing them again, is NOT DIFFICULT...but getting a medical form signed by a doctor IS...I suggest you think the whole thing through again.

Your example is unnecessarily emotive... and to relate the difficulty of this to failure to be honest on a medical form is exaggeration. Things can go wrong in diving to all sorts of people including those that have never been sick in their life and can legitimately tick No to everything on their medical form. I think that once someone has their doctor's approval to dive (which I think all people should get before starting to dive and at periodic intervals) it is really not anyone's business as to what they write on a self-declared medical form that is to be used to limit liability and in general serves no other purpose than this.

To be honest I find it disturbing that a few people here use these as the sole way to determine dive fitness without any actual medical knowledge themselves. An actual dive medical is far more detailed and far more useful than the forms given as examples here that are used by dive operators and instructors.

 

[RJP]

Your example is unnecessarily emotive...

Tell that to the family of the woman who's body I towed back to the boat, or the others who hoisted her on the deck, or those of us who rendered life support and put her in the basket. Ask the Coasty who was swinging in the basket, or the pilot that flew her in from 30mi offshore, or the paramedics who met the chopper and transferred her to an ambulance and transported her from the Coast Guard station to the hospital, if my "example" is "unnecessarily emotive."

 

[Sas]

Tell that to family of the woman who's body I towed back to the boat, or the others who hoisted her on the deck, or those of us who rendered life support and put her in the basket. Ask the Coasty who was swinging in the basket, or the pilot that flew her in from 30mi offshore...

What about all those who have died who didn't lie on their medical form? n=1 in your example, and is not convincing to me.

 

[lulubelle]

One of the things that I find funny is the number of people who don't want to disclose a health issue "to someone who has no medical training" who are perfectly comfortable with their OWN lack of medical training to determine that their medical issue has "no potential to cause a problem."

Trust me, putting my life at risk by having me jump off a boat in the middle of the ocean to save some idiot's @ss will make my life - and their's - much more difficult than if they had been honest on the form in the first place.

If you think rolling a body over in the water, immediately realizing the person is gone when you see that they are blue with pink foam coming from their mouth and nose, towing their lifeless body back to the boat, having five people struggle to pull the body up onto the deck, waiting for what seems like hours for the Coast Guard chopper, loading them into a basket lowered to the deck of a boat that is moving through 4' seas at 10kts, crossing your fingers as they're hoisted up, and never seeing them again, is NOT DIFFICULT...but getting a medical form signed by a doctor IS...I suggest you think the whole thing through again.

You missed my point entirely.

I DO have medical training, and if you had read my previous posts, I clearly indicate that medical training or not, any diver should be cleared by his or her physician to dive. I also stated that people with known health conditions, including those which have "no potential to cause a problem" should also have their specialty physician clear them for diving.

The point I made is that if the known condition has "no potential to cause a problem", then I would not disclose it on a dive medical form which is all about liability. I also made the point previously that if a diver has a condition which does have the potential to cause a problem (think respiratory or cardiac for instance), they are obligated to share this with their buddy and the dive operator in the interest of safety and to provide a dive doc's clearance to dive.