Preventing And Avoiding Altitude Sickness

The term acclimatization or “acclimation” refers to the body’s compensatory processes to adapt to the low-oxygen, low-atmospheric pressure environment. From day one, your body will start to make adaptive changes to compensate.

Things you’ll notice:

• Breathing deeper, sometimes faster
• Elevated resting heart rate
• Potentially higher blood pressure.

As you ascend slowly, your body has certain mechanisms it uses to adapt:

• Producing more of the oxygen carrying hemoglobin
• Higher erythropoietin production, this is a hormone from the kidneys that increases the manufacture of red blood cells
• Lower volume of plasma, which can increase risk of dehydration.
• Higher kidney function as excess bicarbonate ions are excreted as a result of changing acid/alkali balance of blood.

All of these changes are a gradual process, which is why the best and safest summit success rates are had on routes with a good acclimatization protocol. The longer it takes to reach high altitude, the longer your body has to adapt.

By building in acclimatization days “hike high, sleep low” and rest days increases your chances of adequate adaptation, resulting in lower incidence of mountain sickness.

Acclimatization is a complicated process, some people seem to have no problem at all. There are no tricks or hacks, it’s a matter of time, although the medication Diamox has been shown to up regulate the body’s natural acclimatization processes and can help speed it up.