Since 2008 DDRC Healthcare have been conducting their ongoing “Health of Divers” project which has encompassed a broad range of health issues from the use of illicit drugs to more recently, mental health. Last year our researchers turned their attention to “Flying after Diving”.
Since the 1980s there has been much debate about the issue of flying after diving, with workshops in 1989 and 2003. Case reports have been discussed over the years, and recommended times to fly after diving have been debated, as well as the results of the first in-flight study of real-life dive exposures which was published in 2015.
Hyperbaric chambers often see and treat divers who have come back from a diving holiday and present at a chamber with possible DCI problems. Because of this DDRC Healthcare are interested in finding out a little more about divers who fly home after such a holiday – what type of diving were they doing, what was the actual surface interval between their last dive and when they flew home, did they experience any signs and symptoms of possible DCI during the flight, if so, did they seek any help, did any problems they may have experienced go away, what did they think was the probable cause, and so on.
The information the researchers at DDRC Healthcare hope to gather will be valuable in trying to understand a little more about the subject of flying after diving and the results will be published soon.
The DDRC Healthcare ‘Health of Diver’ Research Programme