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FEATURE A Fit and Healthy Dive Team the dive, or knowing what effects various medicines have for divers is vital to health and safety. Because older individuals tend to have a higher mean skin temperature, an equipment change might be needed for the diver who feels more discomfort in colder water or whose physical ability is affected by cold water. Public safety divers cannot usually choose their venue, so cold water may be the rule, but a warmer wet suit or drysuit can help. Despite its popular use, neoprene actually responds poorly to pressure. Neoprene compresses, reduces insulation, and alters the suit's ft. In fact, the space between the suit and the body actually increases as the suit compresses. Good ankle, wrist and neck seals will help—for a while. A dry suit reduces heat loss, but the diver needs wicking fabric next to the skin to reduce loss of body heat 80 LAW and ORDER I October 2013 due to evaporation and conduction. Use synthetic, not cotton, material next to the skin to wick away moisture. Suits that feature a type of in-suit heating may be warm, but they can also create a potential decompression hazard because, if the power is lost, the diver gets cold quickly and might hasten ascent without proper rest stops. Age-related vision changes can be remedied by such means as surgical correction, gas permeable lenses, or a vision-corrected mask. Public safety and commercial divers may have threshold shifts in their ability to equalize mid-ear pressure. The inability to equalize effectively can stress the ear structures, Pollock said, and such stresses could result in transient or even permanent damage. Use the lowest stress equalizing technique that does the job, and that can be done gently and often and early in the dive, he said. "Use the method that works for you, not someone else." Deal with ear infections immediately because some viruses can drop hearing ability 30 to 40 percent and cause permanent damage if not cleared within 72 hours, he said. Also, hearing damage from noise can occur in some public safety and commercial diving. "Avoid extreme noise exposure," Pollock recommended. And, because much public safety diving occurs in contaminated water, wear isolation gear, he said, and wear a helmet to avoid contamination of the head. Replacement joints and orthopedic problems may influence the selection, wearing, transporting, and donning/doffing of diving equipment. Again, judgment must be used to determine whether such replacements will compromise safety. Pacemakers and stents may be compatible with diving after the patient has fully recovered, but such evaluations must be done on a case-by-case basis. "You have to do your homework" with your physician, Pollock noted. Gradient factors may have to be adjusted by the older diver. Maximum allowable pressure should be set at 30/70, Pollock recommended. "Keep the ascent profle lower," so that individual needs and tolerances can be met. Dive computers can be reliable and fexible, but they might give a "false sense of security," he said. "Build in a safety margin and, as you age, build in more." He added that weights should be able to be ditched in one effort to release all the weights. Putting weights in back pockets or where they cannot be easily ditched will affect a diver's control. "Dive smarter; not harder," Pollock said. Medications can have positive effects on health, but they also