The MCL&A’s new exhibit, “Under Pressure: Hyperbaric Medicine at Duke” is now on display. Featuring the Duke Center for Hyperbaric Medicine and Environmental Physiology, the exhibit charts the Center’s development, activities, and achievements since its beginnings in the early 1960s. Items on display include documents, photographs, and promotional materials spanning the Center’s history.
The Duke Center for Hyperbaric Medicine and Environmental Physiology is the major facility in the Southeast and provides patient care treatment for medical conditions – such as carbon monoxide poisoning and decompression sickness – using 100% pure oxygen. The facility also has been a hub for innovative research, such as the record-breaking Atlantis dives during the late 1970s and early 1980s, which proved that humans could function and work well underwater at great depths.
In addition to the history of the Center, the exhibit also highlights the Undersea and Hyperbaric Medical Society, the Divers Alert Network, and Dr. Charles Shilling, a leader in the field of hyperbaric medicine, and his involvement with the rescue of the submarine U.S.S. Squalus.
You can learn more about the history of hyperbaric medicine at Duke by reading our article in The Herald-Sun [article no longer available as of 06-03-2020].