The Wilderness Medical Society (WMS) convened an expert panel to develop the most up to date evidence-based guidelines for prevention and treatment of acute mountain sickness, high altitude cerebral edema, and high altitude pulmonary edema. Here’s how they describe their goal:

“Travel to elevations above 2500 m is associated with risk of developing 1 or more forms of acute altitude illness: acute mountain sickness (AMS), high altitude cerebral edema (HACE), and high altitude pulmonary edema (HAPE). Because large numbers of people travel to such elevations, many clinicians are faced with questions from patients about the best means to prevent these disorders. In addition, clinicians working at facilities in high altitude regions or as members of expeditions traveling to such areas can expect to see persons who are experiencing these illnesses and must be familiar with prophylactic regimens and proper treatment protocols.

To provide guidance to clinicians and disseminate knowledge about best practices, the Wilderness Medical Society (WMS) convened an expert panel to develop evidence-based guidelines for prevention and treatment of acute altitude illness. Preventive and therapeutic modalities are presented and recommendations made for each form of acute altitude illness. Recommendations are graded based on the quality of supporting evidence and consideration of benefits and risks/burdens associated with each modality. These recommendations are intended to apply to all travelers to high altitude, whether they are traveling to high altitude for work, recreation, or various activities including hiking, skiing, trekking, and mountaineering.”

Suggestions range from the gradual ascent approach (staying over a night in Denver before heading up to the ski resorts) to taking Ginkgo Biloba extract to avoid AMS symptoms. One modern method I found of particular interest is the use of personal Hypoxic Tents to acclimatize before you even hit altitude:

“Commercial products are available that allow individuals to sleep or exercise in hypoxic conditions for the purpose of facilitating acclimatization before a trip to high altitude. Only 1 placebo-controlled study has examined their utility. Although this study demonstrated a lower incidence of AMS in persons who slept in simulated high altitude conditions compared to normoxia, technical difficulties with the system resulted in a substantial number of study participants not receiving the intended hypoxic dose. Although the systems are marketed to be of benefit and anecdotal reports suggest they are widely used by climbers and other athletes competing at high altitude, there are no data indicating increased likelihood of summit success or improved physical performance. As with the preacclimatization approaches previously described, any benefit that may accrue from these systems is more likely with long hypoxic exposures (>8 h per day) for at least several weeks before planned high altitude travel. Short and/or infrequent exposures, including exercise training, are likely of no benefit. In addition to the cost of the systems and power needed to run them, individuals face the risk of poor sleep, which over a long period of time could have deleterious effects on performance during an expedition.

Recommendation. Hypoxic tents can be used for facilitating acclimatization and preventing AMS, provided sufficiently long exposures can be undertaken regularly over an appropriate number of weeks and other factors, such as sleep quality, are not compromised.

Fascinating stuff and really worth reading the full text whether you practice medicine in the high country or are just a frequent visitor and looking to cut down on the effects of altitude change. Thanks to The Wilderness Medical Society for publishing.

READ FULL TEXT ARTICLE HERE

Images from hypoxico.com

 

 

Unofficial Networks Newsletter

Get the latest snow and mountain lifestyle news and entertainment delivered to your inbox.

Hidden
Newsletters
This field is for validation purposes and should be left unchanged.