{Technical] Microparticle production, neutrophil activation & intravascular bubbles.+

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Doc,
Very interesting article. It mentions they used VO2 Max measurements , though the Houston non-exercise test is unlikely to be the right tool for the job, as I am guessing it would be a poor predictor of aerobic capacity for the study if you had any elite athletes in the control group.....and this "would" be of interest to me, given that I would expect certain key differences would come out in a study like this, where an elite athlete is going to show different biochemistry in their ability to perform the "workloads" than the other non-elite test subjects would show, without the inflammation responses that would result in the general population of subjects.

When George Irvine and I were playing with doppler studies and high VO2 max scores to predict a better, more individualized set of tables for WKPP exploration level divers , there were very large differences between George and I ( with VO2.max over 65 ml/kg) and how fast we would clear after an aggressive profile ( like 125 feet for 20 minutes on air and non-stop ascent) ...as well as our sense of "wellness" in the hours following--which could lead to desire to enjoy something like a bike ride.....if you get a significant inflammation response to the aggressive profile, the inflammation response triggers enough biochemical alterations, to make you feel uncomfortable with the thought of doing anything physical or stressful... I think this study you referenced, may well get to the heart of much that was involved in what we were playing with !
George, with the help of Bill Mee and Dr Bill Hamiliton, did go on to create special trimix tables, individualized with VO2 Max , and his profiles at Wakulla ( 280 feet for 6 hour run time for 3 mile cave penetration, then 12 hour DECO to out of water) were enough to have the Navy's Spec warfare guys showing up at most of the big "pushes", because George was doing things with these tables the Navy had thought could not be done...and without DCS.

[FONT=Lucida Sans Unicode, Arial, Lucida Grande, Tahoma, Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif]My expectation, would be that low VO2 max, correlates with higher inflammation responses after diving..... The direct correlation we first worked with, was that the high VO2 max individuals had peripheral adaptations to intense aerobic and anaerobic training---perfusion differences and off gassing potentials from this were mostly what we were focused on, but there was a definite inflammation curve for both the aggressiveness of the dive ( for afterward) and for the individuals, which would be predicted by VO2 max scores --by their feeling of wellness and lack of noticeable inflammation response hours later....So a low VO2 max scoring diver, would be expected to reach a high inflammation response with a much less aggressive profile than the high VO2 max diver.[/FONT]
[FONT=Lucida Sans Unicode, Arial, Lucida Grande, Tahoma, Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif]I think that among the adaptations to intense training, is the activity of enzyme systems that RESIST inflammation. I always did much better in this regard, when averaging high concentrations of Vitamin C , along with most of the other notable vitamins for removing free radicals. I would expect that the optimal diet and optimal level of vitamins and co-enzymes, plus intense aerobic training, WOULD alter inflammation response from bubbling.[/FONT]

[FONT=Lucida Sans Unicode, Arial, Lucida Grande, Tahoma, Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif]If any of this rambling can be shown to be accurate, then this is a great argument for ALL Divers to decide that they "ought to" exercise their aerobic and anaerobic systems, in SHARP CONTRAST to the long held Dive Agency position that diver fitness is rarely relevant, except in cases of serious medical conditions.[/FONT]
 
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This study reinforces the relationship of microparticles to bubble grades in humans. Thus, if this could be made into a simpler blood test, we could measure decompression stress without dopplers. Doppler used requires a trained technician and an echocardiogram machine but blood assays can be more routine and possibly stored for later analysis.

Note the doppler bubbles scores used were not the Spencer grade that was used at the time Volker talks about, nor the modified KM Bubble grades which was used off/on as attempts to further refine Spencer. Rather, its Alf Brubbak's newer grade for echocardiograms, which is far more sensitive and may not be audible by the traditional hand doppler used in most prior studies.
 

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