Jelly fish stings

[aloha scuba mom]

Aloha, i have another question. Im really new to diving and i have been on two different boat dives that someone got stung by some kind of jellyfish. They were both tougher younger guys. I have a feeling if it was me i would want to relieve the stinging. So what do you recommend i carry with me that might help relieve stinging? I live and dive in Hawaii. Thanks

 

[walke121]

You can buy over the counter sting reliever. Don't rub the effected area or you will deploy the remaining nematocysts(stingers). Vinegar will neutralize remaining nematocysts that haven't been discharged. Hot water will denature the proteins in the stingers and reduce pain.

 

[Garrobo]

Spray the sting with vinegar or pee.

 

[Aquabear]

Below is the link for DAN and a page for Marine sting types and their treatments.

About the middle of the page is the standard Jellyfish.

A natural remedy is to pee on the sting area - ie if on the leg. Vinegar, aspirin for pain, Benadryl for allergic reaction an others.

I got hit with J-fish and fire coral- more irritant than intense pain but thats me- we are all built differently

https://www.diversalertnetwork.org/medical/articles/article.asp?articleid=36

Good luck.

 

[Garrobo]

To go a little further with my initial response, while I was living in Honduras my Honduran wife and I took some of her neices and nephews up to CocaCola Beach for outings of beach swims and fish lunches about onece a week. Between the ships flushing out their tanks and the jellies which come around in herds it was sometimes a little dicey whether you could swim on certain days or times of day. Anyway, before we left home she would have a couple of the kids pee in a spray bottle and would fill another with vinegar. I don't know what the type of jellies they were and you couldn't see them because the water was so turbid in the surf but some of them would actually cut the skin when the tentacles were drug across. Pretty painful to say the least but the pee and/or vinegar worked every time to take the sting out.

 

[gcbryan]

I'm not sure what the various jellys are that inhabit your area. I don't think I've seen any while in Hawaii.

Here in the PNW we have Moon Jellys and Lion's Manes in particular. The former are only mildly irritating while the latter make you feel like your face has been set ablaze!

My advice would be to learn which ones are the worst and to give them a particularly wide berth!

 

[Diver0001]

Spray the sting with vinegar or pee.

Has anyone ever actually tried urine for this? I know this advice gets repeated a lot on the internet but I have my doubts as to how effective it would be.

The fact that it gets repeated a lot doesn't convince me that it would work. What actual *evidence* is there, if any?

ON the DAN site they recommend vinegar and a topical decontaminate such as rubbing alcohol or ammonia but they do not recommend heat or urine.

Urine does get mentioned under the sea urchin section saying that it's not likely to have much effect.

Anecdotally I've tried urine on bee stings and it doesn't work for that either.

Unless someone has actual experience with this, I'm leaning toward writing it off as an old wives tale.

R..

 

[BioLogic]

Has anyone ever actually tried urine for this? I know this advice gets repeated a lot on the internet but I have my doubts as to how effective it would be.

The fact that it gets repeated a lot doesn't convince me that it would work. What actual *evidence* is there, if any?

ON the DAN site they recommend vinegar and a topical decontaminate such as rubbing alcohol or ammonia but they do not recommend heat or urine.

Urine does get mentioned under the sea urchin section saying that it's not likely to have much effect.

Anecdotally I've tried urine on bee stings and it doesn't work for that either.

Unless someone has actual experience with this, I'm leaning toward writing it off as an old wives tale.

R..

Never tried it, but I have some physiology to offer. The vinegar works because it's a weak acid. Urine is weakly acidic the majority of the time, but its pH varies by body conditions. Personally, I'd try it if I had nothing better at hand.

Pee can pick up bacteria as it leaves you, so I wouldn't assume the stuff is sterile.

 

[Garrobo]

Like I said before, pee or vinegar did the job for us. As far as pee being sterile, who knows? In some of my old African hunting books from the late 1800's pee was the best thng they had for leopard scrapes and spitting cobra venon in the eyes. I saw a TV program where there are a bunch of Monks somewhere over in Asia who recycle their pee every day by drinking it and other than being spaced out on religion like they all are they don't seem to have any any adverse effects from it. Not for me though.

 

[akmike907]

Carry a small squeeze bottle (ketchup bottle from the store) in your dive bag (if you bring your dive bag to the site) filled with simple distilled vinegar and you should be good to go.

Barring that, move to Alaska, even if you get hit by the Lion's Mane, the water is so cold that if you do get hit in the tiny portion of your face that is exposed, it's numb and by the time it's not numb anymore, the stinging will have worn off. Ciao!