Pregnancy and Diving

[mike_s]

Playing "shake the coke bottle" with a developing nervous system is a spectacularly bad idea. It also violates the standards of all training organizations, and is forbidden by all medical personnel who understand SCUBA diving.

hmm..... like I or anyone else would want to take dive lessons from an instructor who will violate training agency standards and put life at risk.

 

[DivingPrincessE]

hmm..... like I or anyone else would want to take dive lessons from an instructor who will violate training agency standards and put life at risk.

I don't think most tourist types who go to Belize and think it would be neat to get certified to dive would realize the danger she is taking. Students assume that instructors know best, so there must be nothing wrong with diving while pregnant. It's her boss and coworkers who should take note.

That said, she probably won't show for another two months or so, so she'll just keep doing what she is doing until then, with no one being the wiser.

 

[Cave Diver]

Source: Diving While Pregnant

Simply stated, pregnant women should not dive. It poses health risks to themselves and their fetus.

Pregnant women have increased amounts of body fat and 3rd-space fluid retention, each of which tends to trap nitrogen and other gasses due to poor circulation through those areas. This predisposes them to decompression sickness and air embolism.

While fetuses do not form gas bubbles more easily than women, even a few bubbles are likely to be very dangerous to the fetus because of fetal circulation. In adults, bubbles tend to be filtered by the pulmonary circulation through the lungs, but in fetuses, there is a bypass of the lung circulation through the foramen ovale and ductus arteriosus. This means that bubbles will not be filtered but may instead go directly to the brain or coronary vessels, possibly causing stroke or death.

There is also evidence that diving may produce birth defects, including limb reductions, cardiac malformations, and other problems, although this area has not been carefully researched.

 

[Rick Murchison]

bubbles are likely to be very dangerous to the fetus because of fetal circulation.

That's the fact. The proof. Asymptomatic bubbles - and lots of "normal" dives have asymptomatic bubbles - in you are filtered out by the lungs. The baby's circulation bypasses the lungs and asymptomatic bubbles *will* go into the peripheral arteries where they will do damage to the tissue when they reach the capillary bed and lodge there. Could be brain damage. Could be bone damage. Could be eye, ear, or muscle damage. Could be damage to any vital organ.
Pregnant diving is a very bad idea.
Rick

 

[boulderjohn]

Jennie007,

As I read over this thread, I find it honestly very touching. A whole host of people you have never met are showering you with what I see as nothing less than an outpouring of love and affection. They want nothing but the best for you and your baby-to-be. They are begging you to do what almost everyone agrees is the right thing to do.

I know it is a very difficult time for you, and I know this decision is difficult. But please try to sit back and think what is best for you and, most especially, your baby.

At the shop where I do my contract instruction, there is a woman who has had two babies while I have been there. In each case, from the moment she decided to try to become pregnant, she stopped in-water instruction--even in the deep end of the pool. The shop and the rest of us accommodated her needs nicely. In her classes, she taught only the academic portions, with the rest of us taking over the rest of her classes. She did shallow water work with children's Discover Scuba parties. She taught first aid, etc. Then, after delivery, it was back to her regular schedule.

I am sure that something like that can be worked out with an understanding employer. If it is not an understanding employer, then I don't see it as a dream job.

 

[Dr Deco]

Hello Jennie007 and Readers:

I am always pressed for time lately and will submit a short note for the moment. Very conservative diving [one half the bottom time for that depth] will probably work. That is science, not good practice – or sense. I am in full agreement with the earlier posters on this thread.

There are few reports for problems so I might guess the problem is small. That is not science or statistically valid. It is really a sophistry. It would require hundreds of dives to demonstrate the odds and this will not be done under current conditions. Never terminate the pregnancy - that is a sure bad outcome.

“No amount of experimentation can prove me right, but a single experiment can prove me wrong.” Einstein


Old Research

My study with non-invasive Doppler monitoring [not surgically implanted probes] found that the fetal sheep and goats developed gas bubbles by the middle of the second trimester. [Powell MR, Smith M, Spencer MP. Fetal and maternal bubbles detected noninvasively in sheep and goats following hyperbaric decompression. Undersea Biomed Res 12:59-69, 1985] The major question is the passage of bubbles in the absence of the pulmonary filter in the fetal circulatory system. This is the crux of the problem when in utero - - no way to eliminate what, for us, are harmless bubbles in the venous system.

As history, the measurements were made transcutaneously, and the second trimester was the earliest we could get blood flow signals. The goats and sheep were dived on graded profiles (increasing bottom time) to their bends-no bends point. It was found that, even when this bottom time was one half of the bends-no bends point, the fetus was producing bubbles. Therefore the old thought that you can dive to one half the allowed bottom time (NDL) is very suspect and unreliable.

One of the goats was born with a limp, by the way.

Since the fetus in the EARLY first trimester [five or six weeks] does not move appreciably, I would not expect it to generate tissue micronuclei. I would speculate that it is UNLIKELY that a fetal DCS problem would develop before the woman knew that she was pregnant.


Dr Deco :doctor: