It could happen to anyone who dives

s75952004

I hope your recovery keeps going well .
do you have "dan" insurance ?
I know the uk has public health care , with private also , here in canada {thank god} with your dcs sickness ,ascess to the correct doctors is no problem. I would check out the "pfo" angle ,I understand they are hard to find read alot about them on scubaboard.

UKSteve

Hi,

If I was you I would locate my nearest NHS funded chamber and present myself to them directly - they are all bloody excellent in the UK. They will have access to a consultant hyperbaric doctor who can in turn refer you elswehere in the NHS infrastructure as he/she sees fit.

Best wishes for your ongoing recovery mate!

Steve

Simon TW

Did just that, Dan covered everything when I was in Bonaire and the doc who phoned every day from Italy told me to see someone when I got back here.

I did the rounds today and I've just got back from the Chamber in Hull. I have now to see some specialists but the prognosis is that I'm suffering from baratrauma caused my the intense exposure to O2.

If all the O2 damage heals well then I should be getting a medical referee in a month or so.

Simon Mitchell

Hello Simon,

Yet another very frightening story very well told.

First, I'm not absolutely clear on the timeline of all of this, and whether or not you are completely recovered. I say this because if it was all a matter of a few days ago, and if you are not completely recovered then you should be seen in the UK as a matter of urgency to review the need for further treatment. I may have missed this information in my quick read so my apologies if this is irrelevant.

In situations like this I am always slightly disturbed to read posts in which people ask if the diver has any idea of "the cause" of their event. As implied in the title of this thread, Simon has provided us with an entirely plausible cause with no need for further elaboration: he performed a moderately deep long bounce dive. We have no clearly validated method of decompressing from these dives, and add to that the potential physiological variation between divers and within divers from day to day, and such events should come as no great surprise. Unfortunately, we have to accept that they will occur.

In addition, I have no doubt that the issue of PFO tests will be raised again, and Simon may end up having such a test, and it may reveal a PFO (there is at least a 30% probability). I would like to observe, pre-emptively, that the finding of a PFO would not prove that it had anything to do with this event, especially if the PFO was small and difficult to provoke into shunting.

Simon M.

dantheman

What is it about Bonaire??

( http://technicaldivingops.com/pages/...#Anchor - bent )

Glad you recovered enough to tell us about it!

--dan

Simon TW

I read this last year and then I meet the doctor "Dick" who was his friend. Good luck to divers on Bonaire now, the hospital has run out of money and they stopped accepting paitents on the day I left.

SimonK

Hope you make a rapid recovery.

We all at least pay lip service to the idea that day to day and person to person variations can lead to a bend on a seemingly harmless dive. To get such a bad hit on a dive that is apparently well inside the "limits" is frightening.

If its proven that there is something wrong with you or your equipment then everyone can shrug and carry on beliving 'its not going to happen to me'. More likley, from whats been posted so far, there is no medical or mechanical problem and as you say 'it could happen to anyone'

Get well soon

Simon

LS_DK

Hey,

wauw, what a story.. Scary stuff.

May I ask what computer you were using ?

Thanks,
Lasse

s75952004

hi
how is your recovery coming ?
I do hope you are doing well

Simon TW

Thanks for your concern, I'm at present back in Hurghada on the Red Sea. It's a real bummer watching all the divers. However I've bought a new snorkle (tech black) and I've done a little snorkling.

My lungs are still recovering from the "burn" they received from the O2 so I still get out of breath easily but I'm fighting a loosing battle at trying to stay fit.

I've had lot's of tests in the UK, it was difficult to get them sorted as I seemed to be speaking a foreign lamguage to the local Doctor. I called the local Chamber and they advised that I calledd the Royal Navy emergency Doctor. I did this and everything fell into place.

The Navy Doc reffered me to the Chamber at Hull who saw me as soon as I could get there. they did tests for residual nitrogen and all was clear. they then did lung Xrays and breathing tests. I was referred to an eye specialist and he did more tests.

It apears that in addition to all the other bends that I had that I have also received an eye embolisum in my right eye. This has left me with a grey spot in my vision however, the brain being what it is will stop seeing this in time so although it is permanent damage it shouldn't cause too much trouble in future.

When I was discharged from hospital my vision had improved, I normally need reading glasses for when I'm reading for a prolonged period (i'm long sighted)but the high concentration of o2 had resulted in Myopia.(short sight) I read about this in Mod 1. What this meant was that I could read even the smallest print without glasses.

This soon wore off and my vision has got much much worse. I now need glasses to see my finger nails.

The Doctors and eye specialists in Hull want to see if things get worse or stay the same so I don't see them again until early December when I will have further tests on my sight and checks for a PFO.

In the meantime there didn't seem much point staying in Cold Dark England so I thought I would come to warm bright Egypt for a couple of weeks, at least here I can get in the water if only to snorkle and look longingly below at the divers.