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The signs and symptoms of these may present during a dive, on surfacing, or up to several hours after a dive. 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).
DCS often causes air bubbles to settle in major joints like knees or elbows, causing individuals to bend over in excruciating pain, hence its common name, the bends. Individual susceptibility can vary from day to day, and different individuals under the same conditions may be affected differently or not at all.
Decompression Illness (DCI) comprises two different conditions caused by rapid decompression of the body. These conditions present similar symptoms and require the same initial first aid. Scuba divers are trained to ascend slowly from depth to avoid DCI. Although the incidence is relatively rare, the consequences can be serious and potentially ...
Diving medicine deals with medical research on issues of diving, the prevention of diving disorders, treatment of diving accidents and diving fitness. The field includes the effect of breathing gases and their contaminants under high pressure on the human body and the relationship between the state of physical and psychological health of the ...
Scuba diver decompressing at a planned stop during ascent from a dive. The physiology of decompression is the aspect of physiology which is affected by exposure to large changes in ambient pressure. It involves a complex interaction of gas solubility, partial pressures and concentration gradients, diffusion, bulk transport and bubble mechanics ...
Dysbarism refers to medical conditions resulting from changes in ambient pressure. [1] Various activities are associated with pressure changes. Underwater diving is the most frequently cited example, but pressure changes also affect people who work in other pressurized environments (for example, caisson workers), and people who move between different altitudes.
Narcosis results from breathing gases under elevated pressure, and may be classified by the principal gas involved. The noble gases, except helium and probably neon, [2] as well as nitrogen, oxygen and hydrogen cause a decrement in mental function, but their effect on psychomotor function (processes affecting the coordination of sensory or cognitive processes and motor activity) varies widely.
Oxygen toxicity is a condition resulting from the harmful effects of breathing molecular oxygen (O. 2) at increased partial pressures. Severe cases can result in cell damage and death, with effects most often seen in the central nervous system, lungs, and eyes. Historically, the central nervous system condition was called the Paul Bert effect ...