[Principles of acute management of the severe diving accident]

The basics of the acute management of severe diving accidents are outlined by means of 25 patients (20 patients presented with decompression sickness, 5 suffered from a barotrauma of the lungs with consecutive air embolism) treated at our facilities. Contrary to widespread notion, disturbed vital functions have to be treated by intensive care measures, prior to the definite recompression therapy. These are: (1) Treatment of generalized or localized tissue hypoxia secondary to bubble-generation; (2) puncture of a (valvular-) pneumothorax after a pulmonary barotrauma; (3) haemodynamic stabilization when cardiac or spinal shock is present; (4) improvement of the rheological situation. When vital functions are unstable or endangered, these patients must not be transported in a monoplace chamber. This type of chamber does not leave any access to the patient in case of a deteriorating status. Since the severe diving accident mostly turns out to be a problem of intensive care medicine in close combination with the recompression therapy, the continuous integration of the recompression protocol with a comprehensive intensive care therapy is considered crucial.