Word: scuba
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 1957-1957
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...daily confronted with unfamiliar problems. In the New England Journal of Medicine, one of the Navy's top underwater medicinemen, Lieut. Edward H. Lanphier, offers a primer. Dr. Lanphier, of the Navy's Experimental Diving Unit in Washington, D.C., is principally concerned about amateurs who use "scuba"-the skindiver's abbreviation for self-contained underwater breathing apparatus...
...bubbles through the pulmonary veins and into the heart. The bubbles usually travel to the brain, causing convulsions and unconsciousness, and unless the victim is treated promptly by recompression, he is almost certain to die. The greatest danger of air embolism is in emergency ascents-perhaps after the scuba has gone out of kilter at great depth. Dr. Lanphier notes: "Only a well-instructed and coolheaded diver can be expected to repress the powerful instinct to hold his breath on making his way to the surface. Air embolism is believed to be second only to drowning as a cause...