Pregnancy and Diving

Should a pregnant woman scuba dive?

Whether expectant women should dive is a question that affects not only female divers but also their partners, dive buddies and dive professionals. Most divers can recall from their open water training that women are encouraged to stop diving during pregnancy, but few classes go into further detail. What are the risks of diving while pregnant? What is it about scuba diving that is dangerous for a developing fetus? The published literature provides a foundation for the discussion.

As with all research, there are limitations on how much the available studies can tell us. For ethical reasons, experiments with pregnant women are very limited. Most studies conducted with humans are surveys, and surveys have weaknesses, most importantly that they are not as easily controlled as laboratory research and that they can easily be biased. A survey of female divers who had recently given birth included 69 women who had not dived during their pregnancies and 109 women who had. The nondiving women reported no birth defects, while the diving women reported an incidence of 5.5 percent. To provide perspective, the survey author stated that the latter rate was within the normal range for the national population. The small sample size and the likelihood of selection bias in those responding to the survey make the results even more difficult to interpret. While surveys can establish correlations, they cannot confirm causal relationships. In this case, they cannot confirm that diving caused a defect. To obtain such data, scientists rely on more highly controlled animal studies.

Heather E. Held, B.S. and Neal W. Pollock, Ph.D.