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M
y good friend, Bill, and I were attending the
Beneath the Sea dive show in Secaucus, N.J.,
this past spring. It had been an enjoyable
show; we checked out the new equipment on
display and attended a few seminars, including an excellent one
on the treatment of decompression illness (DCI) by Dr. Nick
Bird, DAN’s chief medical officer. We also had been helping
our friend Thomas Hurtado, the general manager of Scuba
Cancun, at his booth, which was right across from DAN’s.
Bill is an experienced emergency medical technician (EMT)
in New Jersey, and I am an EMT in Maryland. Bill and I
are dive buddies, and we have done volunteer dive-rescue
work as support crew at American Power Boat Association
hydroplane races. Both of us have taken DAN’s dive medical
technician (DMT) course and are DAN® Instructors.
We’re firm believers in furthering our own education in
dive medicine as well as helping to promote dive safety by
teaching; every diver who gets first-aid training strengthens
the network of safe diving.
After the show ended we were helping some folks break
down their booths and chatting with our friends at DAN.
Suddenly a young lady ran up and asked frantically, “Is there
an EMT here?” I immediately told her I was one, and she
said, “A man cut himself while taking down his booth, and
he is spurting blood all over the men’s bathroom.”
Her description of the injury seemed to indicate an
arterial bleed; the risk with such a bleed is shock, a true
emergency in which substantial fluid or blood loss results in
insufficient blood to supply the body. Unchecked, an arterial
bleed can lead to loss of consciousness and death from
shock in a matter of minutes. These thoughts were racing
through my mind as she spoke.
Go Get DAN!
48
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SUMMER 2012
RESEARCH, EDUCATION & MEDICINE
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