At the Undersea Hyperbaric Medical Society (UHMS) Annual Scientific Meeting, DAN produced six papers, two collaborative papers and funded two more. With additional five papers from International DAN organizations – DAN contributed approximately one-third of the diving medicine presented at the meeting.

I gave an oral presentation about effectiveness of predive checklists, with Shabbar Ranapurwala, doctoral student in epidemiology at UNC as a first author. The paper is coming, but let me tell you in confidentiality, checklists work, even in diving. It was confirmed in a randomized trial conducted in three dive resorts. Volunteers received either a predive checklist and a postdive report (the intervention group) or the postdive report only (the control group). Divers who received the predive checklist experienced fewer mishaps during the dive than divers who did not receive it. Divers in control group were not prohibited from using their own checklists nor were they reminded to do so. The reduced number of mishaps in the intervention group indicates the effectiveness of predive checklists in prevention of accidents and a value of reminding divers to use it.

To learn more, read “Checklists: Keys to safer diving?”

Post written by:

Petar Denoble, MD, D.Sc.

Dr. Petar Denoble is the Vice President of DAN Medical Research. After graduating from medical school, Dr. Denoble joined the Navy in the former Yugoslavia and specialized in naval and diving medicine. For 13 years he was involved with training, supervision and treatment of divers in open circuit, closed circuit, deep bounce and saturation diving. His doctoral thesis focused on studying oxygen consumption in underwater swimming. He has been at DAN for 20 years where he has been involved in the development of the largest database of exposure and outcomes in recreational diving, the monitoring of diving injuries and the study, treatment and prevention of fatal outcomes and long-term consequences of diving accidents.