Trip Report Why I Won't Be Returning to Cozumel-Part 1,2&3

[uncfnp]

Other things you can do...

*5 minute (or longer) safety stops
*take your BCD off in water when an option, especially if you have pushed the limits
*Avoid straining/exercise after a dive.
*No hot tubes or overheating (a hot day in the sun in Cozumel) post dive

 

[ggunn]

Other things you can do...

*5 minute (or longer) safety stops
*take your BCD off in water when an option, especially if you have pushed the limits
*Avoid straining/exercise after a dive.
*No hot tubes or overheating (a hot day in the sun in Cozumel) post dive

I may have had a couple of minor incidences of skin bends in years past but I didn't know what it was. In at least one of the cases it was after a long deep dive, the kind I don't do anymore anyway. I hadn't thought about it as a potential problem, but I have always climbed aboard with my BC on; I think I'll stop doing that.

 

[boulderjohn]

Dr Ebersole-another PFO question

 

[kelemvor]

and no one picked up the phone. Are you kidding me? This is a hospital and they don't answer the phone? I called DAN again and he gave me two more phone numbers. I called those numbers and after no answers repeatedly, and then finally getting through a phone tree of press this, press that, I got a real person 20 minutes after I talked to DAN. After describing my symptoms, the person asked if I wanted an ambulance. I felt capable of walking down to the lobby of the hotel and getting a cab, but he said there were no cabs in Cozumel at 1:30 a.m., so I agreed to the ambulance. (I had not rented a car for the trip.) He said it would be about 20 minutes. After waiting 30 minutes, I called, asked where the ambulance was and he said 15 more minutes. After 45 minutes, I called again. The person says, "You are at the Westin, right?" I said, "No, I told you I'm at the Wyndham Hotel Cozumel." He said, "The ambulance is at the Westin. I'll send them to you. It'll be 10 minutes." Finally, after an hour, I'm picked up. Had this been a life-threatening event, I would be dead in the hotel parking lot by the time they arrived. And as a side note, I noticed cab drivers in the hotel parking lot, so I could have taken a cab.

So I learned something after reading this. Hospitals in Coz must be different than the US in more ways than just the lack of keeping patients alive by feeding them and providing blood transfusions. There's 10 (or more) hospitals in Cozumel alone! In the US there are usually just one or two. Typically the main one will be "such and such general hospital". There is a Cozumel General Hospital, but on google it appears to be even smaller than the others...

A quick google for hospitals in Cozumel yields:

Amerimed Cozumel Islamed
Calle 85 Esq. Adolfo Rosado Salas

Centro Medico de Cozumel (CMC)
1st South & 50th Ave.

Clinica de Issste
1 South & 60th Ave.

Clínica Médica San Miguel
Calle 6 North #132 entre 5 y 10 Avenida

Clínica Villanueva
10 Ave.# 19 at 6 North

Cozumel Cruz Roja Mexicana
65 Ave. & 25th Street

Cozumel General Hospital
11 Sur y 20 Ave Sur

Hiperbárica de Cozumel
6 No. Entre Aves. 5 & 10

IMSS
11 Ave. between 30th & 35th

International Hospital
5th Street South between Avenues Melgar & 5th

Maybe the word hospital means something different there. Seems hospital is more like what we would call "doctor's office" or maybe "clinic".

The large number of tiny hospitals in Coz almost certainly accounts for the great disparity in reports of quality by patients.

Hiperbárica de Cozumel seems like an interesting choice for something like this. I'm sure that was the intent when they named it.

 

[dflaher]

Thanks for the list. I know of two locations above that have chambers - the International Hospital (across from Aldora) and CMC (also known as CostaMed I believe)

 

[jbjclj]

I was in the International Hospital for 5 days with DCS 2 (11 chamber rides). Incredible hospital (ocean view room), fabulous attentive staff. They ordered lunch and dinner from Rock N Java

 

[drrich2]

All snark aside, considering how American hospitals often upcharge many things (e.g.: Tylenol) and hospital food has a...well, less than excellent reputation for tasty food, the idea of a Cozumel hospital offering me restaurant food in a city known for cheap but tasty food...gotta say, that dark cloud might just have one sweet silver lining. Unless the hospital puts a big upcharge on it.

Having to do your own blood drive, on the other hand...wow...

Now I can't get the image of ambulances with restaurant to-go menus out of my head.

 

[uncfnp]

The dependence on family for meals may be based on the strong role of family in the hispanic culture. And take out as a modern solution. (Speculation only)

 

[living4experiences]

That includes 99.999999999999% of all dive computer owners. (The remainder are the SB regulars). Never had any health issues before. Should they have changed to a more conservative setting prior?

Agreed. It's one of those one-and-done settings. When I got my Peregrine a few months ago, I talked to a technician at Shearwater about some of the settings to be sure the defaults were correct for me. He asked me about my diving style and told me the preset default setting should be fine for the gradient factor. What I didn't want was a bunch of alarms going off all the time when I'm doing nothing wrong.

 

[living4experiences]

Dr Ebersole-another PFO question

An interesting read...thank you.