The Network works when people talk to each other. Every member has a personal profile on the Network page: use it to get in touch with one another, for a study, a congress, a consultation, a course. And if you are running an initiative, write to us: we will make it known to the whole Network, on the website and here in the newsletter.

One small step helps everyone: log in with your code, click the pencil icon and update your bio, publications and links. The more complete your profile, the easier you are to find.

FIAS conference on decompression, prevention and rescue in diving, held in Italian. «Luigi Durand De La Penne» Auditorium, ITTL Nautico San Giorgio, Porto Antico, from 3 pm. Talks by Silvio Zerbi, Andrea Murdock Alpini, Marco Mori and Giovanni Cappa. Registration required by 2 November.

Aula Magna, Collegio Cattaneo, 1:45–6:30 pm, in Italian. Chaired by Silvio Zerbi and Paolo Severgnini; speakers include Vincenzo Benenati, Claudio Camponovo (DAN Europe), Carmela Graci, Andrea Moriondo, Rosario Cacopardo and Andrea Murdock Alpini. Free, up to 90 participants, registration on the training portal (event ID 223241.1).

With ITECC and Eurac Research at terraXcube: burns, hypothermia and avalanches, decompression illness, from pathophysiology to treatment. Full programme and registration coming soon: we will share them as soon as they are final.

Courses, congresses and training days on extreme environments, diving and hyperbaric medicine: we publish them on the website and, from this issue, in the newsletter too. We do this voluntarily and free of charge, to help quality initiatives reach the people who will truly value them.

One of the most widely read oncology journals in the world devotes a clinical review to hyperbaric oxygen therapy for late radiation injury: skin fibrosis, osteoradionecrosis, radiation cystitis and proctitis. The authors review randomised trials, cohorts and real-world data and point out the open gaps: patient selection, optimal protocols, long-term outcomes. The signal is clear: hyperbaric medicine is entering the language of care for long-term cancer survivors.

An up-to-date synthesis of how spaceflight changes the eye: spaceflight-associated neuro-ocular syndrome (SANS), corneal epithelial injury, possible radiation-related lens changes, retinal and choroidal changes. Most interesting is the section on the limits of diagnosis and treatment in microgravity, from imaging to intracranial pressure measurement: the theme of operational constraints that we know well underwater too.

Sixteen patients with ulcerative colitis refractory to at least two advanced therapies, treated with 10 or 20 sessions at 2.4 ATA. At twelve weeks, clinical and endoscopic response was seen in 2 of 8 patients in the 10-session group and 4 of 8 in the 20-session group, and contrast-enhanced ultrasound showed increased bowel perfusion in responders. Small numbers and an open-label design, but a pathophysiological rationale worth following closely.

Thirty-one days in Chuuk Lagoon, twelve divers, 173 closed-circuit rebreather dives, a mean maximum depth of 38 metres and almost a hundred minutes per dive. Spirometry and visual acuity checked weekly: no significant change overall, but one diver lost lung function and another developed mild obstruction. Within oxygen exposure limits, long expeditions are sustainable, but individual variability is real.

A competitive freediver surfaces from 117 metres with severe neurological symptoms: hemiparesis, aphasia, altered consciousness. With the hyperbaric chamber 24–48 hours away, the team attempts in-water recompression on pure oxygen with a full-face mask, starting at 18 metres: substantial recovery, and complete resolution after a second treatment. The authors themselves stress the risks, oxygen toxicity and drowning, and the safety issues that emerged. A case worth knowing, not a protocol to imitate.

Our contribution. An experienced 46-year-old diver who had undergone successful pulmonary vein isolation was monitored during a 42-metre dive with a marinised 12-lead Holter and during a hyperbaric chamber compression to 2.8 ATA, with his implantable loop recorder active throughout. No atrial fibrillation recurrence, no arrhythmias, stable heart rate; the loop recorder remained fully functional after both exposures, while telemetry failed because of shielding by the chamber’s steel walls. It is the first hyperbaric electrophysiology assessment described in a post-ablation patient: a starting point for fitness-to-dive decisions in these patients.

It searches PubMed and OpenAlex at the same time and hands you a ready-made bibliography. Everything that usually takes three websites and a reference manager:

The map of Italian dive centres curated by Gli Amici di Boyle: over 700 centres in 20 regions. Search by name or town and the listing opens straight away, or explore region by region. Useful if you are planning a dive trip to Italy or need to recommend a centre to a patient.

The data come from public sources and we are verifying them: if you know or run a centre, every listing has a form to report corrections.

The sea, once it casts its spell, holds one in its net of wonder forever.

Jacques-Yves Cousteau