LT Collapses, Later Dies, At Ranger School

[Red Flag 1]

The physical I got when getting cleared for dive chamber rides was extensive. It included X-rays of everything, bone marrow (OUCH), EKG,EEG, treadmill, CAT scans, etc. They stopped at invasive stuff, though they talked about heart cath. They were looking for reasons to DQ people. The routine physicals for recruits do miss some things.

 

[DocIllinois]

The physical I got when getting cleared for dive chamber rides was extensive. It included X-rays of everything, bone marrow (OUCH), EKG,EEG, treadmill, CAT scans, etc. They stopped at invasive stuff, though they talked about heart cath. They were looking for reasons to DQ people. The routine physicals for recruits do miss some things.

Bone marrow, geez. Okay, never doing dive stuff.


When I went through my Ranger physical it was a little more extensive than the "normal" version, but still kind of... hurried. The CTMC was fairly crowded on that day, though.

 

[Red Flag 1]

Bone marrow, geez. Okay, never doing dive stuff.


When I went through my Ranger physical it was a little more extensive that the "normal" version, but still kind of... hurried. The CMTC was fairly crowded on that day, though.

My kids are all qualified divers, and physicals were non issues. My job was to accompany patients on chamber dives for medical reasons. They picked Surgery and Anesthesia residents because we were good with our hands, and were pretty good at following directions. A lot of applicants were turned down even before we got to the physicals. The bone Marrow study just about had me walking out the door. We were often required to give meds, and pull some blood samples, etc., during the dives. Everything we gave a patient had to be double checked with staff outside the chambers. We dove with patients from just about every specialty, and some for decompression sickness. Those for decompression were usually on call cases, some taking 200 to near 300 minutes of chamber time @ 60'. Yup, another call list rotation; I was never home. One of the risks of chamber dives was oxygen toxicity. When I was diving, we did not have the luxury of PulseOx technology that is so common place today.

 

[policemedic]

If you are looking for abnormalities, you may turn something up. If you are using a snap shot look at a young healthy person, you usually get a young healthy person.

But then: Sudden death in young people: Heart problems often blamed - Mayo Clinic.

It would have been instructive to see the presenting rhythm when the LT coded. It would have been better to have identified an issue prior to the code. 12-leads, iStats and clinical judgment can often turn the tide when used early.

 

[policemedic]

The physical I got when getting cleared for dive chamber rides was extensive. It included X-rays of everything, bone marrow (OUCH), EKG,EEG, treadmill, CAT scans, etc. They stopped at invasive stuff, though they talked about heart cath. They were looking for reasons to DQ people. The routine physicals for recruits do miss some things.

I'd call bone marrow testing invasive...fuck that.