The UIAA Medical Commission held its annual Commission Meeting on 27 March in Kathmandu, Nepal, supported by UIAA member federation, the Nepal Mountaineering Association (NMA). The meeting attendees comprised: George Rodway [USA, Commission president], David Hillebrandt [UK, vice-president], Buddha Basnyat [Nepal, host], Alireza Behpour [Iran], Andrew...
“The importance of adequate caloric and fluid intake must be rated as least as highly as that of oxygen” Dr Griffith Pugh Over the past two decades, the UIAA MedCom has published a vast library of Medical Advice papers on a variety of mountain-based subjects. These papers are...
The 1st Canadian Climbing Medicine Symposium will be held in downtown Toronto at the historic Steam Whistle Brewery, 31 July - 1 August, 2017. The event is endorsed by the UIAA Medical Commission and the Alpine Club of Canada, a UIAA member federation. In response to the...
The UIAA Medical Commission is delighted to report the overwhelming response to its paper ‘Drug Use and Misuse in the Mountains: A UIAA MedCom Consensus Guide for Medical Professionals’ which was published in 2016. The paper has been downloaded over 10,000 times and has proved a...
The UIAA is saddened by the news that former UIAA Medical Commission President and longstanding UIAA Medical Commission member Bruno Durrer passed away at the age of 62 earlier this month. “Bruno was very much an internationally respected figure in mountain medicine and mountain rescue, and more than...
The work of the UIAA Medical Commission is respected and recognized throughout the world of mountaineering. The Commission’s mission of increasing knowledge about mountain medicine among doctors, mountaineers and lay mountain users is achieved through several different means. In order to provide the best possible advice...
The UIAA Medical Commission’s article ‘Drug Use and Misuse in the Mountains: A UIAA MedCom Consensus Guide for Medical Professionals’ has been published by High Altitude Medicine & Biology. High Altitude Medicine & Biology is the first peer-reviewed journal focused exclusively on the latest advances in high...
The UIAA Medical Commission held its annual meeting on the 3,000m ski resort of Telluride, Colorado (USA) on Thursday 4 August. The meeting was one of many international committee meetings that were incorporated into the 7th World Congress of Mountain & Wilderness Medicine, a biennial congress...
Planning an expedition or travelling to high altitude in the coming weeks or months? The UIAA Medical Commission's guide to altitude sickness provides some key advice. What is altitude sickness? Altitude sickness is an "umbrella term” and includes 3 components: Acute mountain sickness (AMS) which is essentially...
The UIAA Medical Commission has released a new recommendation dedicated to the current outbreak of the Zika Viral Infection. The document charts the background of the disease, its relevance to climbers and mountaineers and presents the UIAA Medical Commission’s current advice. To download the document please click...