Tayla,

I think your different style of debate will make our discussions much more interesting and enjoyable. I love to debate because people do get caught up in them and winning isn’t about points or money but about helping people in the best way each side knows how,

I’m sorry if there were complaints about questions; everyone knows I beg for questions. The only reason I can think of that would cause anyone to complain is that they are tired of reading my answers. They want you to stop asking me questions so that I will stop answering them.

I said to you that I had asked my team about your theory and their reply was that it may occur as the result of RSD following the use of the tourniquet for Bier blocks! If I understand your answer correctly, your team is saying that a tourniquet followed by a block can cause IRI. If they believe that, I wish they would publish it. IRI experts don’t agree on exactly how long the tourniquet must be applied, but I don’t recall anyone estimating less than 15 minutes.

Evidence that tourniquet ischemia (TI) for the brief period when blocks administered could lead the experts to reconsider how long an ischemia must exist before IRI develops.

Still, this would only show that briefer periods of TI are necessary to develop IRI, NOT that the RSD plays any role in causing it. Physicians don’t blame the underlying condition that required the TI and surgery as in any way causing IRI.

I’m curious about the role the vascular surgeon plays in your RSD treatment team. I would imagine it would be finding the cause of the cyanosis/hypoxia, so what does she/he have to say about that? Is he/she working to identify that cause? Does she/he have any opinion?

Thank you for your offer to explain the mechanism of the action of HBOT for RSD but as I thoroughly research all treatments I have, I was well informed before I started my 50 dives. Sorry I didn’t make myself perfectly clear: I intend to write a post on the mechanisms of action so others will have a reason to read more about the immune response to trauma and IRI.

I have never seen anything in the literature about the mechanism of action of HBO in RSD; it is the mechanism of action in skeletal muscle IRI, so whatever you learned in your research probably has nothing to do with what I will write about.

I want to make it clear that I believe that standard protocols for HBO are inappropriate for RSD, and that special precautions (the same ones used for IRI) are essential. Many RSD people have tried HBO because they learned it helped someone else, and when these precautions were not taken, a lot of them reported initial improvement followed by catastrophic relapse; sometimes coming out even worse than they went in.

All of this will be discussed at length in my upcoming post on HBO.

I wrote: RSD “experts” want to believe this disease is caused by a nerve injury, but they can’t prove it. They have done a damn good snow job on us, though; we think they’ve proved it. And you replied:

Vicc I think the fact that nerve blocks, ketamine, mirror imagery amongst many other treatments have proven to be helpful in RSD is proof enough that this is an injury of the nervous system. They simply wouldn't work otherwise.

I don’t dispute nerve injury; I argue that it is the result, not the cause of RSD. The fact that drugs can provide temporary pain relief doesn’t prove that nerve damage causes RSD; it only proves that drugs can relieve neuropathic pain.

I stand by what I said in many previous posts: There is absolutely no research linking any nerve injury, any place on the body, with RSD, Hell, they can’t even find any nerve damage in what they call CRPS-I. If you want to prove me wrong, find some research.

I would now like to refer to your quote " I WISH RSD 'EXPERTS" WOUULD BE THIS HONEST. IF THEY WERE THEY WOULD STOP PRETENDING THAT CYANOSIS DOESN'T EXIST IN RSD AND ADMIT IT IS THE MOST LIKELY CAUSE OF OUR RSD. THEY WOULD TELL US THE TRUTH. RIGHT NOW THEY ARE LYING TO US AND IT'S HURTING US"


First, if you change the font from lower to uppercase, most people follow the quote with the words (emphasis added). That way the reader knows I didn’t use caps.

Vicc, who are these doctors? You say 'they' as though it is all of them. When I say “they”, I mean every RSD “expert” who has published a list of diagnostic criteria for this disease and left out cyanosis. That means just about all of them; Including R Schwartzmann of Dexter University and A Kirkpatrick, Chair of the Scientific Advisory Committee and Director of Research of the Reflex Sympathetic Dystrophy Syndrome Association (RSDSA). They are two of the big guns in RSD in this country, and they are not telling us the truth.

I have had many tests to ascertain what oxygen levels I have in my RSD areas. I had to have one before I qualified for HBOT.I’d sure like to learn what those tests were; I’m not aware of any tests needed before someone undergoes HBO, so if there is something useful, I sure want to know about it.

Vicc, my fellow RSD sufferers here in Australia are most grateful for the knowledge and commitment our doctors show to research and treat our RSD, there are no complaints from me regarding their lack of knowledge and they have the results to give them encouragement to continue. Really? Every one of them? No dissatisfied customers at all? We complain all the time here in the States…Vic