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JR (and other interested folks) I stumbled across the techdiver forum this evening and was very intrigued by the caliber of discussion taking place. It will take me some time to catch up on all the discussion threads, but I was particularly interested in the discussions of in-water recompression therapy in response to (and prevention of) symptoms of decompression sickness. The points raised in this debate are very familiar to me. Dave Youngblood & I recently wrote an overview article on this topic, which is supposed to be published in the "Proceedings of the Tek'93 conference" (Which Bill Hamilton tells me actually will get published in the near future). I chaired the session on this topic at the recent Tek'94 conference, so I'm reasonably familiar with the issues. The position in this debate maintained by JR Oldroyd is pretty much EXACTLY in synch with our beliefs: Technical divers, who are making dives to depths where DCS is a large concern, and who are generally already familiar with in-water oxygen DEcompression techniques, SHOULD get familiar with published IWR techniques, and should get the right equipment to perform it properly. We've found that "A little knowledge is a dangerous thing": A lot of divers, who know just enough about IWR to give it a try in an emergency (or worse yet, try it INSTEAD of going to a nearby chamber), but don't know enough to perform it properly, are the ones who are most likely to get in trouble. YES! IWR can and DOES save lives. YES! IWR done improperly can and has turned a sore shoulder into permanet paralysis. There are no black&white answers here - there are just too many variables involved with the decision to perform it. The only good advice is; 1) divers doing radical deep dives should learn AS MUCH AS THEY CAN about what is known of diving physics and physiology; and 2) divers should take responsibility for their own actions - at all levels. Incidently, the "5-minute" figure was arrived at based on data from rates of bubble growth in agarose gel, in conjunction with nerve-cell hypoxic survival times. All of this is discussed in our article. If the thing doesn't get published soon, I'll do what I can to make it available as an ASCII file. I look forward to reading future discussions on this and other "technical" diving issues. I could go on and on for hours, but it's past one in the morning, the wind is howling outside, I have to go to work in the morning, and so I'm going to bed now. Aloha, Richard Pyle Ichthyology Bishop Museum Honolulu, HI 96817 deepreef@bi*.bi*.ha*.or*
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