A clear lack of interest from the current administration of the Hospitals of the Algarve Group, despite having an agreement in place to have this life-saving equipment installed, has enabled the Hospital Particular in Alvor to step in and accept a new Hyperbaric Chamber.
Hyperbaric chambers, also called decompression chambers or recompression chambers are sealed chamber in which a high-pressure environment is used primarily to treat decompression sickness in divers, gas embolisms, carbon monoxide poisoning, gas gangrene resulting from infection by anaerobic bacteria, tissue injury arising from radiation therapy for cancer and wounds that are difficult to heal.
The service was destined to be opened at Portimão Hospital but now the equipment is being installed in the Hospital Particular do Algarve.
Luís Sá Couto from MUSUBMAR (Associação para a Promoção e Desenvolvimento do Turismo Subaquático) which is running the wreck diving for the Ocean Revival project off the Alvor coast, said the management of Hospitals of the Algarve expressed "a clear lack of interest" in the equipment despite having the authorisation to buy it.
The Chamber is a bulky piece of kit, weighs 24 tonnes and costs a cool €1 million but it is no flippant purchase as the entire Algarve coast until now has been without any way of treating divers with decompression.
Lisbon and Oporto can offer this life-saving treatment and the installation of the Algarve unit in Portimão Hospital would have completed national coverage.
Paulo Sousa, the clinical director of the private hospital said the equipment will be fully installed and working before the summer season.
When contacted by media today, the administration of the Central Hospitals of the Algarve had no comment to make.
