Safe Diving: a Medical Handbook for Scuba Divers

by Allan Kayle

354 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1994

About the author

Allan Kayle is a medical doctor. He contributed to Divestyle magazine, has written several diving-related books and is twice past president of the South African Undersea and Hyperbaric Medical Association. A Match for Doctor Koekentapp is his first novel.

Reviews

[Alex Cooper · Rating 5 out of 5]

I just started it. This is a very readable reference book and its detailed content is well-balanced. You want to keep certain things--like the information on what to do in an emergency--handy, and this is where a book is superior to a computer but it can be tricky deciding how much info to devote to each topic. What will you cover and how much of each topic do you delve into?

This is where experience comes in. Only someone who has logged considerable diving experience can do this accurately. The author, Allan Kayle, is a South African doctor whose 30-year career revolves around sports medicine, scuba diving in particular.

I like his style. He begins each topic with background information. He has a solid approach that only mentions the diving-related aspect of the topic. From Chapter Four, "Implications of Age, Gender and Body Build," came this discussion about "Physical Factors Affecting Women:"

"There are specific differences particular to women divers, not because of any lack of ability or understanding, but simply because women are women. These differences are due to both physical and psychological factors. Some are advantageous, some disadvantageous, and others are myths."

Next, a single paragraph takes up Fat Distribution followed by three more that concisely dispels the myths of Menstruation and Breast Implants. The author correctly spends more time discussing Pregnancy and answers an important question: can a pregnant woman dive? Yes, she safely can but her fetus bears the risk.

"The answer has to do with the foetal lungs. Unborn babies float in amniotic fluid, a protective liquid that suspends them within the muscular wall of their mother's uterus. Their lungs are non-functional in their liquid environment and all of their oxygen, carbon dioxide and nitrogen needs are handled via the umbilical cord and placenta. The placenta is not just a lump of inconvenient flesh that is discarded after a delivery. It is an amazing union of mother and child, a unique organ comprising half of mother's tissue and half of child's, with maternal capillaries looping to touch, but never joining, the baby's matching capillary loops. It is an intimate network of totally separate blood supplies, providing sustenance and oxygen to the baby, and removing metabolic end-products and carbon dioxide for excretion via the maternal kidneys and lungs. A mother and child's circulations do not mix; they are the blood supplies of two different people-- the mother's capillaries providing and nurturing and the child's taking and excreting."

Isn't that a comprehensive and clear introduction of the answer? The information in this book is worth savoring. Thankfully, that's the case because aside from being well-written, there's also a lot of digesting involved, and that takes time.