Altitude Sickness, Viagra, and Bubbles on Flights

The previous post Altitude Sickness During Flights told how certain symptoms occurring during air travel are from exposure to altitude.

If a craft were not pressurized, cabin pressure would be equivalent to the air pressure outside the aircraft at whatever altitude. At high altitude, there would not be enough air pressure inside for crew to be functional enough to fly. This was one of my areas of study with the Navy. Crew in unpressurized craft wear oxygen-delivery equipment.

Passenger planes are pressurized. The inside is kept at a higher pressure (lower equivalent altitude) than flight altitude (the air outside the plane). The pressure is still not as much as at sea level. Keeping that much interior pressure would create huge fuel costs and extreme metal fatigue on the craft. Regular passenger aircraft keep interior pressure equivalent to mild altitude exposure.

In the last few years, Viagra (sildenafil citrate) has been tested by various groups, including the military, as intervention against altitude sickness. Recently it was also found that the drug reduced symptoms, thought to be jet lag, after flights. My guess is that it was effective for symptoms from flights because of the same properties that may help reduce symptoms, in some, of altitude sickness.

Another component that I discovered many years ago in my work in altitude sickness, was a bubble component - an altogether new dimension to the altitude sickness puzzle. Decompression sickness bubbles can form in the body when coming up after a scuba dive. I found the same kind of bubbles can form in your body when going to elevations encountered in aircraft and mountain travel, with no prior scuba diving. More of this in future posts. Decompression sickness is also an issue when going into space during extra-vehicular activities. Click Space Walks.

Altitude sickness in flight is different from (or in addition to) the motion sickness of flight motion, or being stiff after not moving enough during long flights. The post Exercise and Stretch for Long Travel Sitting covers some exercises and stretches to relieve those problems.

Labels: aerospace, altitude, drugs, injury, scuba

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