The Diver Medical Questionnaire, Question by Question

Every dive course starts with the same sheet of paper: the Diver Medical Participant Questionnaire, the RSTC screening form used by PADI, SSI, NAUI and most training agencies worldwide. Answer no to everything and you hand it to the shop and get in the water. Answer yes to anything and a physician has to evaluate you and sign the Physician’s Evaluation Form first. This guide walks the questionnaire area by area: what each question is really asking, why it matters underwater, and what a yes means for your clearance.

How the questionnaire works

The standard form is a set of yes or no screening questions about your health history, with follow-up boxes that narrow a yes down. It is not a test you pass or fail. It is a filter: no answers mean no physician is needed, and yes answers mean an individual medical judgment before training. At DiveSlip, the intake asks the same screening in condensed form, your date of birth covers the age item automatically, and the physician reviews the details live on the video visit.

One rule before the walkthrough: answer honestly. The questionnaire is a signed medical document. A quiet no on a real condition puts you at genuine physical risk at depth and can void dive insurance. Most honest yes answers clear.

Lungs, heart, and blood

The first screen asks about lung, breathing, heart, or blood problems that affect your normal physical or mental performance. Pressure and gas exchange are the physics of diving, so respiratory and cardiovascular history gets the closest look. Mild, well-controlled asthma with recent normal spirometry is frequently clearable on records plus the visit. Coronary disease, unexplained chest symptoms, or a history of collapsed lung are the other direction: those need in-person dive medicine, and the evaluation tells you so rather than clearing them on video.

Exercise and fitness

The form asks whether you struggle with moderate exercise, walking a mile in about 14 minutes or swimming 200 yards without resting, or whether health or fitness has kept you from normal activity in the past year. Diving is exertion: surface swims, currents, climbing a boat ladder in full kit. A yes here usually means the physician talks through what limits you and what your day-to-day capacity looks like.

Eyes, ears, nose, and sinuses

Equalization is the most common physical problem in diving, so the form screens for eye, ear, nose, and sinus history. Resolved ear or sinus surgery, fully healed, is on the frequently clearable list. Active problems that block equalization matter more than old ones that healed clean.

Surgery in the last 12 months

Recent surgery, or ongoing problems from a past surgery, gets a yes. What the physician wants is simple: the operative note or a clearance letter, and evidence things healed with full function. Remote orthopedic injuries with full function are frequently compatible with recreational diving.

Neurologic history

Loss of consciousness, migraines, seizures, stroke, a significant head injury, or an ongoing neurologic condition all screen yes. These histories vary enormously, which is exactly why the form routes them to a physician instead of a checkbox. Be aware that a seizure history specifically is one of the answers that cannot be cleared over video anywhere honest; it needs in-person dive medicine evaluation.

Behavioral health

The form asks about treatment for psychological problems, panic attacks, or drug or alcohol addiction within the last five years, and about diagnosed learning or developmental disabilities. The question underwater is judgment and panic risk in an environment where surfacing fast is dangerous. Stable, treated history with a clear record is evaluated on its facts, on a live visit with a physician, not by an algorithm.

Back, hernia, ulcers, and diabetes

A mixed box on the standard form. Back problems and hernias are mostly about load and exertion in gear. Diabetes splits cleanly: type 2 diabetes, well-controlled without insulin, is frequently clearable with records, while diabetes treated with insulin needs in-person evaluation and is one of the answers that ends the online path before payment.

Stomach and intestines

Stomach or intestine problems, including recent diarrhea, screen yes. On a dive trip this is mostly about dehydration, medication, and how recently things settled. Bring the timeline and the treatment; the visit handles the rest.

Prescription medications

Prescription medications get a yes, with two exceptions on the DiveSlip intake: birth control does not count, and anti-malarials do not count unless mefloquine. What the physician actually reviews is the condition behind the prescription and whether the medication itself is sedating. Controlled blood pressure on non-sedating medication is a textbook clearable yes.

The over-45 box

The standard form carries an age item: over 45 combined with cardiovascular risk factors. DiveSlip reads this from your date of birth, so there is no separate box to tick. Divers over 45 with a normal cardiovascular history are frequently clearable; what changes with age is how carefully the cardiovascular questions get asked, not the answer.

The five answers that end the online path

An honest online evaluation has to know its limits. Five histories cannot be safely cleared over video and need in-person dive medicine, sometimes with testing: chest pain, known heart disease, an abnormal heart rhythm or heart surgery; a collapsed lung (pneumothorax); seizures or epilepsy; diabetes treated with insulin; and pregnancy, where clearance is deferred rather than declined. The DiveSlip intake stops you at a referral screen before you pay. If a history like this surfaces later in an evaluation you already paid for, the referral comes with an automatic 100% refund.

What happens after a yes

Flag your yes answers, upload the records they relate to, and meet the physician on a scheduled video visit of about 15 minutes: Dr. Adam Z. Kawalek, a board-certified internist and PADI certified diver, licensed in 29 states. When clearance is appropriate, the completed, signed RSTC Physician’s Evaluation Form arrives in your inbox the same day, signed under his own name, NPI and state license, with a verification code your dive shop can check. The whole thing is $91 flat. If you cannot be safely cleared online, you get the referral and every dollar back.

For the bigger picture on the form itself, see our guide to the PADI medical form and when a physician must sign it. If your own doctor already said no, start with why doctors decline the dive medical and what to do.