Nitrogen Narcosis and Decompression Illness.

Nitrogen Narcosis and Decompression Sickness.

In this blog you will find information about two barotraumas that are very common: Nitrogen Narcosis and Decompression Illness.

Themes

Decompression Illness.

What produces Decompression Illness.
Consequences of the illness.
How to prevent it.
What happens in the body

Nitrogen Narcosis:

What produces Nitrogen Narcosis.
Consequences of the disease.
How to prevent it.
What causes in the body.

Objectives:

We want to establish the important role that nitrogen plays in both diseases and how pressure affects the state of aggregation of it.

How is Nitrogen Narcosis and Decompression Illness produced?

This blog was designed to prove the objective that nitrogen plays an important role in Nitrogen Narcosis and Decompression Illness, taking in consideration that the pressure affects the state of aggregation of the element in matter.

Both diseases were searched and investigated. We accomplished our objective because the information we obtained from articles and different web pages proved that nitrogen and whether if its state of aggregation is gaseous or liquid causes both illnesses, respectively.

Keywords: nitrogen, state of aggregation, Nitrogen Narcosis, gaseous, liquid and Decompression Illness.

Summary

The air tanks that divers use are composed by 78% to 80% of nitrogen gas. As the diver descends the pressure increases, more partial pressure causes more gas dissolving in the liquid (which in the human case will be the blood ). Nitrogen in its liquid form travels through blood to the Nervous System, where in contact with the lipid membrane of the neurons dissolves in them, causing its thickening and increasing the flow of sodium and chlorine ions. It is an interference on the electrochemical processes that are necessary for the exchange of electrical potential in the synaptic buttons. Ascending to the surface will make all the symptoms that causes this disease to go away.

While in Decompression Sickens, as the diver ascends to the surface the pressure decreases, therefore the partial pressure of the nitrogen causing it to go from liquid to gas again. Nitrogen bubbles collect together forming larger bubbles in the bloodstream, this causes many problems, however it can be resolved by breathing high oxygen fraction gases at an oxygen partial pressure of between 2.8 ATA.

Introduction:

Nitrogen Narcosis is an altered state of mind caused by breathing nitrogen at a high partial pressure. The deeper a diver descends, the higher the partial pressure of nitrogen and other gasses in his air will be.

Narcosis has been called the “rapture of the deep” and many divers compare narcosis to a feeling of pleasant drunkenness. In fact, divers sometimes use the “Martini Rule” to roughly estimate the effects of narcosis during a dive. Depending upon the source, the Martini Rule states that for every 30 or 60 feet of depth, a diver experiences the narcotic effect of drinking one martini.

Decompression Illness is a disorder in which nitrogen is dissolved in the blood and tissues by high pressure forms bubbles as pressure decreases.

Air is composed mainly of nitrogen and oxygen. Because air under high pressure is compressed, each breath taken at depth contains many more molecules than a breath taken at the surface. Because oxygen is used continuously by the body, the extra oxygen molecules breathed under high pressure usually do not accumulate. However, the extra nitrogen molecules do accumulate in the blood and tissues.

REFERENCE:
Gibb. N. (2015). Decompression Sickness vs Nitrogen Narcosis. 10/01/2016, de about sports Sitio web: http://scuba.about.com/od/divemedicinesafety/p/Decompression-Sickness-Vs-Nitrogen-Narcosis-Whats-The-Difference.htm