A hyperbaric chamber is a an air tight encased device where one or more people are exposed to different mixtures of pure oxygen and natural air at different atmospheric pressures. The two component parts of the word hyperbaric are hyper and baric. Hyper is commonly defined as meaning extra or more and baric is a measure of atmospheric pressure, for example the pressure within a barometer. Therefore hyperbaric can be literally defined to mean extra pressure. These chambers come in various shapes and sizes and while most are made or iron or steel, there are many newer hyperbaric chambers made of soft materials.
These hyperbaric chambers are at a minimum large enough for a single person with some chambers used in larger diving or military applications having the capacity to hold up to 9 or 10 people. Most traditional hyperbaric chambers are only built for a single person.
When the person enters the chamber they normally lie on their back during the chamber processes. Once sealed with the person inside, the chamber is then filled with varied amounts of oxygen, depending on the specific therapy, using a series of valves and an air compressor. The air within the chamber is monitored and the specific air mixture between oxygen and traditional room air is altered to fit the prescribed therapy. Most therapies target a 100% oxygen level with the person being given periodic breaks where they are able to breathe traditional room air in order to avoid oxygen toxicity.
Some chambers, normally the ones with more than a single person capacity, also have those inside the chamber wearing sealed hoods where their personal airflow can be altered without changing the overall body exposure to the pressurized oxygen. In these situations the air in the hoods is only reduced from 100% oxygen for brief periods, this is to ensure that all of the air in the body, including the air in the lungs, is at a maximum level of pressured oxygen for the longest allowable time.
Hyperbaric chambers are used in medical facilities across the globe to treat a variety of illness and disease including air and gas embolism, carbon monoxide poisoning, gas gangrene, diabetic foot, thermal burns, as well as countless other applications. While these are all approved and recognized therapies, there is promising research in the use of hyperbaric chambers for autism, cerebral palsy, multiple sclerosis, and psoriasis as well as a host of other conditions. The typical use of hyperbaric chambers by diving companies and the military is for decompression sickness and other diving related conditions.