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Decompression sickness (DCS; also called divers' disease, the bends, aerobullosis, and caisson disease) is a medical condition caused by dissolved gases emerging from solution as bubbles inside the body tissues during decompression.
The principal conditions are decompression illness (which covers decompression sickness and arterial gas embolism), nitrogen narcosis, high pressure nervous syndrome, oxygen toxicity, and pulmonary barotrauma (burst lung). Although some of these may occur in other settings, they are of particular concern during diving activities. [1]
Decompression sickness is usually avoidable by following the requirements of decompression tables or algorithms regarding ascent rates and stop times for the specific dive profile, but these do not guarantee safety, and in some cases, unpredictably, there will be decompression sickness.
Decompression sickness occurs during rapid ascent, spanning 20 or more feet (typically from underwater). Decompression sickness may express itself in a variety of ways, including hypoesthesia. Hypoesthesia results because of air bubbles that form in blood, which prevents oxygenation of downstream tissue. [2]
The uptake of gas by the tissues is in the dissolved state, and elimination also requires the gas to be dissolved, however a sufficient reduction in ambient pressure may cause bubble formation in the tissues, which can lead to tissue damage and the symptoms known as decompression sickness, and also delays the elimination of the gas. [1]
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Barotrauma is physical damage to body tissues caused by a difference in pressure between a gas space inside, or in contact with, the body and the surrounding gas or liquid. [1] [2] The initial damage is usually due to over-stretching the tissues in tension or shear, either directly by an expansion of the gas in the closed space or by pressure difference hydrostatically transmitted through the ...
Vertigo is recorded as a symptom of decompression sickness in 5.3% of cases by the U.S. Navy as reported by Powell, 2008 [41] including isobaric decompression sickness. Decompression sickness can also be caused at a constant ambient pressure when switching between gas mixtures containing different proportions of different inert gases.