What is diver's disease?
Decompression, commonly known as diver's disease or caisson's disease, generally refers to the disease caused by the rapid reduction of surrounding environmental pressure. This is a kind of diving hazard and baropathy.
Decompression can occur due to the following conditions:
Divers float rapidly, or do not stay for decompression after a long time or deep dive;
When an aircraft without pressurization facilities takes off;
When the cabin pressurization of the aircraft fails;
The diver took the plane immediately after diving. Even if the aircraft is refueled, the cabin pressure will appear if it cannot be maintained at sea level; Or when the engineers come out of the caisson or tunnel that drains groundwater after pressurization; When astronauts take a spacewalk or engage in extravehicular activities, and the pressure in the spacesuit is lower than that in the cabin.
These conditions will make the gas (mainly nitrogen) dissolved in the body tissue dissolve out and form bubbles in the body to cause disease.
According to Henry's law, when the pressure of a gas on a liquid drops, the amount of the gas dissolved in the liquid will also drop. An example to demonstrate this law is when you open a bottle or can of soft drinks, gas will come out of it, and there are bubbles in the liquid. These carbon dioxide are discharged because the pressure in the container drops to atmospheric pressure.
Similarly, nitrogen is a kind of tissue and body fluid stored in the human body. When the body is exposed to a reduced pressure environment, nitrogen will dissolve in the gas leaving the body. If nitrogen is forced out of body fluids too quickly, bubbles will form in the body, causing symptoms of decompression sickness, such as itchy skin, rash, joint pain, sensory weakness, paralysis and death.
Air embolism caused by other processes is similar to most symptoms of decompression. These two are classified as decompression sickness.
further reading
Diver's disease symptoms
The first is that inert gas forms bubbles, which block the tissues, joints and muscles under the skin, causing severe joint pain and affecting sports and behavior. Symptoms are itchy skin, tingling, rash and so on.
In the second form, bubbles can fill some respiratory and circulatory systems, leading to severe shock and even death. The main symptoms are dizziness, nausea, vomiting and tinnitus.
Can divers heal themselves from illness?
Decompression disease generally cannot heal itself. Decompression disease is a systemic disease caused by improper decompression after working in a high temperature environment, in which the dissolved gas in the body exceeds the saturation limit, and then bubbles are formed in some tissues outside the blood vessels. It can be understood that the solubility of air dissolved in blood is relatively high in a high-pressure environment. After suddenly entering a low-pressure environment, because the solubility of gas decreases, our bubbles will be released from the blood, and then a series of symptoms will occur.