How Freediving and Spearfishing can affect your ears?

Simular to SCUBA diving your ears are very important on every dive you do. However with freediving, you have the added difficulties of doing it using only the air you have once you hold your breathe as well as learning to do it up side down.

When freedivers say they have "ear trouble" it generally refers to not being able to get past a certain depth due to difficulty equalising rather than an unhealthy ear. However below are problems that can occur for Freedivers in regards ears.

1. Swimmers Ear

When water is left in your ear after swimming it creates a moist enviroment for bacterial growth. If your skin lining your ear canal is already irritated or inflammed, this with the combination of stagnent water in your ear canal will encourage an infection to develop in your ear canal.This type of infection is known as Swimmers Ear (Otitis Externa).

2. Middle ear Barotrauma

This is by far the most frequently reported injury among divers. People with barotitis media generally develop symptoms immediately following the dive, but delays of up to one day or longer have been reported. When the diver descends, the pressure can cause injury to the middle ear. This overpressure of the middle ear can cause serious fluid and blood to leak into the middle ear, partially or completely filling it.

3. Ear drum Rupture

Barotraumatic injuries to the ear may result in perforation or rupture of the tympanic membrane. This may occur in as little as 7 feet / 2.1 meters of water.

4. Inner ear Barotrauma

This injury generally occurs when divers attempt to forcefully equalize their ears. This "hard" blowing over-pressurizes the middle ear and can result in implosive or explosive damage to the round and oval windows

5. Inner Ear Decompression Sickness

This generally occurs in deeper or longer dives when decompression stops have not been undertaken correctly. It is caused by formation and growth of bubbles from excess dissolved gas in body tissues, it can happen in many body tissues and the inner ear is one of them.