dcs question

[John A]

As a preventative measure, when my buddies and I were doing a lot of tech diving, we would take ibuprofen (400 mg) prior to diving. The reasons were two fold, ibuprofen acts as a blood thinner so it hopefully would aid in moving any small bubbles in the blood stream into the lungs and not coagulating for filtering and second, it would reduce inflammation if you got a type 1 hit. We would also, on occasion, take 2 more (and lots of fluids, vip) when we got to the surface if the dive was overly strenuous, we just got lazy and blew off some deco or the deco was screwed up in some way. Big caveat, I am not a doctor, so don’t try this at home kids, this is what worked for me and my buddies and it may really screw you up! We also dove really high HE/low O2 mixes and did all of our deep stops, so our problems were always type 1. Don’t know if it would benefit free divers?

[Rik]

Well, aside from my ideas on using Ibuprofen on compressed air diving (not positive), I think it is quite crazy to use any blood thinner in freediving.

Just think what will happen if you get a squeeze during your dive, especially a lung squeeze.

With that said, just look up what the average diving check up book says about the use of anti-coagulants, and you will see that most of them won't let you dive anyway.

A friend of mine posted article on medical drugs on my site, and although it isn't speficially dealing with anti-coagulants, it might be intresting for some of the readers.

And for those who want to use blood-thinners afterall, I would recommend you to talk to your diving physican.

[JasonWelbourne]

I don't think Ibuprofen is a very strong blood thinner

[Rik]

Your right that Ibuprofen isn't a strong blood thinner, but the idea of using any blood thinner for freediving doesn't really appeal to me.

Just to tell people to be cautious with medicine like this and others.

[Adrian]

I think it's quite crazy to use any medication or drugs unless one is ill and under doctor's orders - and still then. The joy of competeing - even if it's against one's self is to know that you did it - not some drug that apart of extracting a possible toll on the body, will leave an empty place in the heart.

Adrian

[John A]

Just to clarify some points, my suggestion for the use of Ibuprofen is way below prescription strength. Second it was based on my use of the product for deep trimix diving which obviously has very little in common with free diving other than some of the depths associated with it. Third, I would find it hard to believe that anyone would consider ibuprofen as a performance enhancing drug. I never suggested that anyone should eat a handful of Coumadin and go diving!
The post was merely to suggest an over the counter product to “possibly” alleviate and/or avoid the onset of DSC by someone that has used it in the past for trimix diving.

[Rik]

I understand your point, and the thought behind it.

However, for both freedivers as tri-mix divers, I don't like the use of Ibuprofen, especially as prophylaxis, due of the major and side-effects. Just look closely to what it does. It is a painkiller, affecting your sensory capabilities of sensing pain. It is quite aggressive for the stomach, and has a full array of other side-effects you don’t really want to have during diving.

Like often, it is a combination of risks. What is the risk that you will have a problem during your dive, or after it, due to use of Ibuprofen (or any other NSAID)? What is the risk on getting DCS? And finally what is the favor of using the NSAID? I still would recommend consulting your diving physican, and I wouldn’t be surprised if the answer could change your mind.

I also believe that any medication, including the use of over-the-counter medication, require a well balanced decision when diving. Most of these medicines aren’t tested under hyperbaric circumstances, and I doubt that any medicine is tested for (deep) breath-hold diving.

If you don’t need medical drugs: Great! If you need them: Ask yourself if you would like to dive with them, or should dive with the reason why you need them. If you want to use medication: consult your diving physican.

Just my 0.2 cents,

Rik

[JasonWelbourne]

Ibuprofen is only a pain-killer as a side-effect. It reduces swelling, which is why it is considered an anti-inflammatory. It's pain killing effects are only effective against pain caused by swelling such as the throbbing pain associated with tooth extraction. It is VERY tough on the stomach, but eating with it usually nullifies that effect. Other than the very minor blood thinning effect, which would only become relevant if a person were to bleed, i can not postulate a mechanism by which ibuprofen could contribute to the demise of a human being under water.

But then again, with the exception of the purchase and use according to directions of OTC medications, I am not even certified to make decisions about my OWN health.

But then again, knowledge is power, and the american medical system is totally screwed up, and I support the idea of educating one's self much more than I support the idea of paying a doctor to summarize from text books that I can find at the local thrift store for $2 a piece.

[Rik]

Textbooks… Mine one is categorizing it as a painkiller, but then again, it is depending how you categorize it, or what for it was used in the first place.

You wondered how Ibuprofen could contribute a diving fatally. Well, I didn’t state that Ibuprofen does. Problems with medications like these are that they often aren’t the cause of an incident, but more a complication.

A general example would be that a diver misdiagnoses an arising pain after a dive. You don’t want to miss a DCS hit caused by medication that dulled the pain enough to make it feel harmless. Ibuprofen won’t be a substitute of oxygen and hyperbaric therapy.

Another example is that of aspirin. Aspirin is mainly used as a painkiller, but also has a well known blood thinning effect. It effect in combination with peoples own constitution is severe enough that some dentist won’t perform a tooth distraction due of the complications that can arise.

Now think of a freediver using aspirin as a painkiller and getting a severe enough contraction that causes a lung squeeze on a relative shallow depth. Combine that with a physician who knows nothing of hyperbaric medicine and isn’t informed about the aspirin use (The over-the-counter isn't a real medicine syndrome).

Impossible? Not quite, that’s the way how you get a classic case of a patient with complication after complication.

How less medicine you use and how healthier you are during your dives, how easier things are when you need to be treated by a physician.

Needing medication? Ask a well-informed physician or think if you really need to dive in your situation. (And write down your experiences for us )

Rik

[John A]

One issue that seems to be being misunderstood is that after every dive there is some bubbling (micro) the more extreem the dive and the use of HE can increase this micro bubbling. It is also well understood that these mico bubbles can and do join up to form bigger bubbles (problem time). Specifically as it relates to Deep trimix diving the use of ibuprofen is not really used as a "prophylaxis" but you are treating what is commenly known to be there.
Now forgetting the ibuprofen issue altogether, jumping to deep free diving the question is, is the deep free diver also experiancing the same mico bubbles? anybody out there know of any doppler testing?

[Rik]

John, I understand the tought behind the use, but still I have questions about its usefulness from a practical point of vieuw. Anyway, if you have any data to support the use of Ibuprofen with (trimix)-diving, I am happy to consider it. You can PM me or contact me through my site.

On Freediving; There is some dopler data from multiple breath-hold diving. So far I know, deep dives haven't been examined yet.

Rik

[Mr. X]

Fish oil is blood thinning:
http://www.healthy-heart-guide.com/n...-thinners.html

http://www.wholehealthmd.com/refshel...25,992,00.html
'Omega-3 fatty acids are also natural blood thinners, reducing the "stickiness" of blood cells (called platelet aggregation), which can lead to such complications as blood clots and stroke.'

...and you can get it by spearfishing.