"Undeserved" DCS hits

[liuk3]

Don't really see anything wrong with technical divers treating a hit like a sports injury from a psychological standpoint. I definitely don't think that it's any badge of honor. When I get hit with a sports injury though, believe me I think a lot about how I can try to avoid it again. I try to do whatever I can to understand and avoid the sports injury, but sometimes it also just happens as well.

 

[Duke Dive Medicine]

I am reminded of something I mentioned something earlier. I read an article in (I believe) Dive Training a few years ago that said there was some indication that unexpected DCS hits might be initiated by minor lung overexpansion injuries and so may actually have aspects of both injuries. It did not say how one led to the other, and it gave no references to an article that I recall.

Do you have any information on this?

John,
I couldn't find the article on the Dive Training website so I can't speak to it directly, but it might have been referring to gas embolism in a diver who doesn't have the classic profile of a rapid/panic ascent. In that case, it's still a gas embolism and not an unexplained DCS hit.

I would also assume that even if there is no direct connection between the two, it wold be possible to have a lung overexpansion injury and DCS on the same dive, wouldn't it?

Yes, I can think of several scenarios where this could happen.

 

[Duke Dive Medicine]

I am reminded of something I mentioned something earlier. I read an article in (I believe) Dive Training a few years ago that said there was some indication that unexpected DCS hits might be initiated by minor lung overexpansion injuries and so may actually have aspects of both injuries. It did not say how one led to the other, and it gave no references to an article that I recall.

Do you have any information on this?

I would also assume that even if there is no direct connection between the two, it wold be possible to have a lung overexpansion injury and DCS on the same dive, wouldn't it?

John,
Addendum to the last post: I was talking with Dr. Moon about your question today and he referred me to this article by Neuman and Bove from 1990, which may be the source of the Dive Training article you read:
Rubicon Research Repository: Item 123456789/2551
It gives three case reports of divers who had atypical spinal manifestations of AGE, along with a couple of theories about how those symptoms may have evolved.

 

[Hammerhead]

"Deserved" perhaps in a karmic sense, and not even DCS, so I apologise, but I had a very strange - and painful - diving experience that I've never quite worked out.

On a boat trip with friends, I decided it would be cool to bring along a few of extra tanks and give some of the "did my cert in 1999, haven't dived since"-types a bit of a swim around in 8m, sandy bottom, good viz, no current, etc. etc. conditions. Each dive maybe 15-20 mins or so.

With me all the time was my then regular dive buddy, so we had two guys at hand if anything went wrong.

Basically, it all went fine, and we even took a couple of guys who were interested, but had no experience at all into the sea from the beach. With the complete novices, we never went deeper than 2-3m, so no biggie.

Anyway, I ended up spending most of the day playing mum to a load of inexperienced divers. It was actually kinda fun seeing their faces as they breathed, yes breathed under water. Total time maybe 3 1/2 hours in the water.

Last dive over, I surfaced near the boat, my buddy helped the new guy to the stairs, and without any warning, something went "pop" in my right knee. I was not even finning at the time, just floating on my back.

It was excruciatingly painful, but being a trooper, I got stuck into the beer afterwards. I limped for a couple of days after as well

No idea what it was, and it's never happened since, but I'm happy to listen to suggestions.