There's a all cosmos under the ocean, and Aqua-Lung dive and snorkeling offer a extraordinary way to get a glimpse of that world. Merely for people with diabetes, it can be tricky to decide whether to nosedive in — due to our want to continually monitor blood sugars to check our safety at all times.

Fortunately, there are many PWDs (people with diabetes) World Health Organization've dared to try, dive successfully and have even managed to figure out ways to even take D-technology underwater with them. We're fascinated by their stories, and naturally the official "diving with diabetes" protocols that do exist only some D-Divers say don't go far enough and are actually too dangerous to use atomic number 3 written — especially in this era of modern-day of D-tech.

Diving with Diabetes: Protocols

The leading authority that sets the rules on this type of matter is the Divers Alert Network (DAN), a radical of non-earnings that aim to improve dive safely. They mapped out specific policies just over a decade agone. Interestingly, before 1997, the DAN had discouraged PWDs from seeking diving enfranchisement because of the hypodermic syringe risk. Aft studying the issue about cardinal decades ago, the network institute shifted its policy on allowing insulin-dependent PWDs to dive recreationally.

It took several more years beyond that for DAN and the professional Undersea Hyperbaric Medical Society (UHMS) to formalize an official policy, followed by a formal policy follow-up from the World Recreational Scuba Grooming Council (WRSTC), established in 1999 to make over minimum training guidelines for certification agencies worldwide.

So that's great, right? Well, sure. Simply it still offers atomic number 102 practical advice to our D-Community on the "how" of rip clams management while diving, so many have opted to either not dive, operating theater to do wholly of their insulin dosing and BG checks earlier getting in the water. And it may not actually comprise safe.

"In my public opinion, it's hazardous because the metre betwixt symptoms and treatment could make hypoglycaemia worse," says T1D peek True heath Rossato, a 20-something from Italian Republic diagnosed in 2009 and World Health Organization's been diving event in Croatia and the Red Sea for eld before that. "Moreover, the fast ascending and skipping the safety quit increase the risk of decompression nausea," she adds.

Diving with Diabetes: Around the D-Community

Inside our Diabetes Online Biotic community (Dr.), we hear stories and see the diverting photos of PWDs who look to be having a blast doing IT. More recently, we've even heard few fellow type 1s percentage their personal practices of monitoring CGM data and blood sugars when they are aquatic on actual dives.

An Italian and Croatian Experience

Earlier this summertime, we saw an Instagram video that Erica shared of her subaquatic experience exploitation the FreeStyle Libre Flash Glucose Monitoring scheme. The 24-class-old med student — who happens to have a dad WHO's an endocrinologist and her parents were both dive instructors when she was young — says she's been diving for eld, symmetrical before diagnosing.

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After T1D diagnosis, she says she tested to just eat glucose underwater to treat oncoming lows, but mostly "continued diving ilk before."

The more she looked into it, the more she saw that in many another ways it seemed like the medical and diving professionals adage diving equally a forbidden or taboo activity for PWDs — particularly when it came to the WRSTC protocol, which she views as a good start but insufficient overall.

  • they recommend keeping glucose levels betwixt 150-300 mg/dL collectible to veneration of hypos, which give notice increase dehydration (dangerous while dive)
  • also their emergency communications protocol is unsound, as they don't treat hypoglycaemia immediately and surface quick — which can addition the likelihood of decompressing sickness

"(The guidelines) are good because they try to give diabetics the opportunity to dive, just also narrow-minded because they precisely teach their protocol and they don't wishing it to be improved… information technology is not incontestable surgery validated yet, sol I think information technology could be re-thought now that CGM is spreading and working."

During a dive in Croatia in May 2018, Erica used a water-tight camera case to secure the handheld reader of her new Abbott Libre FreeStyle flash glucose monitor. She related to it to a bungee corduroy, and found it connected properly direct the showcase and her wetsuit. She was capable to scan and get readings, and the Libre sensor acquiring wet didn't impact her readings. It worked very fountainhead, she says, and "made diving event more tight."

She created a short picture and posted that on Instagram about how she uses the Libre underwater, and since then she's made another pool version showing the Libre scanning as well as how she treats Lows underwater. True heath's continued her experiments with the hope of validating the existing WRSTC and DAN protocols and at length working with those groups to meliorate the guidelines on the books for underwater scuba diving with diabetes.

An Australian Gamble

Our Seattle-based friend Dana Jerry Lee Lewis, well known in the #WeAreNotWaiting biotic community for inventing the do-information technology-yourself closed loop OpenAPS technology, has also been chronicling her diving with diabetes experience late. She just returned from a trip to Australia, where she and her husband Scott Leibrand had more or less scuba dive playfulness in the Great Barrier Reef.

This wasn't the premiere time Dana has been scuba diving and had to factor out her diabetes and OpenAPS system, and she wrote virtually that in early 2017 about how she navigated the take chances in Hawaii. For this a la mode trek crosswise the globe, Dana noted that Australia in reality has some of the strictest diving-and-medical-stipulation restrictions in the world, and there was a specific process there she had to go through with.

This time, using the FreeStyle Libre (much wish Erica described higher up), Danu in use a waterproof phone shell/bag for the handheld receiver, and was healthy to scan her Libre sensor underneath two wet suits.

It worked great, Dana reports!

She shared the full experience in a web log post, piece even on vacation, but noted that her underwater MacGyverying made the multiple dives an even more awesome experience.

"The waterproof case had a strap where you could wear IT some your cervix, which is what I did. That ended up being pestiferous occasionally (because the bag would float preceding you during the give-up the ghost, and sometimes got caught on my snorkel breather), just it worked.(For prox trips I'd probably find a elastic cord to attach it to my BCD where it was accessible but didn't have to swim or be hung close to my neck.)"

Awesome! We also enjoyed eyesight Dana's tips and tricks for any subsurface activities, ranging from using tech to treating and just being mindful of all the D-management tasks piece submerged.

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Diving with Diabetes in Central America and Asia

Diagnosed at 27 back in 2000, Brian Novak in the Boulder, CO, area says that he's been an adventurer with T1D connected board for eld and that has enclosed diving. He's been diving event crosswise the world and is certified in Honduras, Panama, Routan, and Siam.

"Of every last the adventures I've had, nothing is quite as unique as diving," he wrote in a Beyond Type 1 post back in 2015. "I make love it! With some education, training and a little planning, diving is something that most multitude with diabetes should beryllium fit to do."

Brian recently told DiabetesMine that he hadn't used a CGM while diving event and wasn't sure how well information technology might work underwater. Aside from diving, he noted having trouble retention CGM sensors along when spending time in the ocean and so he normally doesn't use his CGM for the week that He's diving.

Hearing Danu and Erica's stories from above and mentioning the Libre, Brian marveled at the possibilities.

"Wow, that's awesome! Being healthy to use a CGM and knowing that you aren't going to barge in piece diving would definitely help put your mind comfortable sol that you can love the dive," atomic number 2 shared in an email. "Very cool down!"

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We totally agree!

We're happy to see stories of how our friends in the diabetes community are using technology (not to mention some cool D- Life Hacks!) to doh what they love to do. We hope that these types of conversations can help others, and perchance even influence switch at the insurance tied.