Arterial blood gases in divers at surface after prolonged breath-hold.

Bosco, Gerardo

Paganini, Matteo

Rizzato, Alex

Martani, Luca

Garetto, Giacomo

Lion, Jacopo

Camporesi, Enrico M

Moon, Richard E

2020-04-16T14:40:29Z

2020-04-16T14:40:29Z

2020-02

2020-04-16T14:40:28Z

PURPOSE:Adaptations during voluntary breath-hold diving have been increasingly investigated since these athletes are exposed to critical hypoxia during the ascent. However, only a limited amount of literature explored the pathophysiological mechanisms underlying this phenomenon. This is the first study to measure arterial blood gases immediately before the end of a breath-hold in real conditions. METHODS:Six well-trained breath-hold divers were enrolled for the experiment held at the "Y-40 THE DEEP JOY" pool (Montegrotto Terme, Padova, Italy). Before the experiment, an arterial cannula was inserted in the radial artery of the non-dominant limb. All divers performed: a breath-hold while moving at the surface using a sea-bob; a sled-assisted breath-hold dive to 42 m; and a breath-hold dive to 42 m with fins. Arterial blood samples were obtained in four conditions: one at rest before submersion and one at the end of each breath-hold. RESULTS:No diving-related complications were observed. The arterial partial pressure of oxygen (96.2 ± 7.0 mmHg at rest, mean ± SD) decreased, particularly after the sled-assisted dive (39.8 ± 8.7 mmHg), and especially after the dive with fins (31.6 ± 17.0 mmHg). The arterial partial pressure of CO2 varied somewhat but after each study was close to normal (38.2 ± 3.0 mmHg at rest; 31.4 ± 3.7 mmHg after the sled-assisted dive; 36.1 ± 5.3 after the dive with fins). CONCLUSION:We confirmed that the arterial partial pressure of oxygen reaches hazardously low values at the end of breath-hold, especially after the dive performed with voluntary effort. Critical hypoxia can occur in breath-hold divers even without symptoms.

10.1007/s00421-019-04296-2

1439-6319

1439-6327

https://hdl.handle.net/10161/20421

eng

Springer Science and Business Media LLC

European journal of applied physiology

10.1007/s00421-019-04296-2

Arterial blood gas

Blood gas analysis

Breath-hold diving

Physiology

Underwater

Arterial blood gases in divers at surface after prolonged breath-hold.

Journal article

Moon, Richard E|0000-0003-4432-0332

505

512

2

School of Medicine

Medicine, Pulmonary, Allergy, and Critical Care Medicine

Anesthesiology, General, Vascular, High Risk Transplant & Critical Care

Duke

Medicine

Clinical Science Departments

Anesthesiology

Published

120