Benzolamide improves oxygenation and reduces acute mountain sickness during a high-altitude trek and has fewer side effects than acetazolamide at sea level.

Acetazolamide is the standard carbonic anhydrase (CA) inhibitor used for acute mountain sickness (AMS), however some of its undesirable effects are related to intracellular penetrance into many tissues, including across the blood-brain barrier. Benzolamide is a much more hydrophilic inhibitor, which nonetheless retains a strong renal action to engender a metabolic acidosis and ventilatory stimulus that improves oxygenation at high altitude and reduces AMS. We tested the effectiveness of benzolamide versus placebo in a first field study of the drug as prophylaxis for AMS during an ascent to the Everest Base Camp (5340 m).

Circulation time in man from lung to periphery as an indirect index of cardiac output.

Circulation time (Ct) between lung and periphery may be a surrogate for cardiac output, estimated here, for the most part, as the time between taking a breath of nitrogen and peripheral detection of a desaturation pulse. Use of pulse oximetry involves an internal, instrument delay; however, using the ear, we found shortening with exercise (12.1 +/- 0.