Dr. Neuman was trained as a Naval Undersea Medical Officer, and has made many original contributions to the field of diving medicine and physiology. He was an undersea medical officer for such diverse commands as Submarine Development Group One, UDT/SEAL PAC 1/3/5, and Harbor Clearance Unit ONE. He retired from the Naval Reserve in 1996.
Dr. Neuman was President of the Undersea and Hyperbaric Medical Society in 1989. Dr. Neuman has been a member of the San Diego County coroner’s committee to investigate diving deaths since 1974 and has an extensive experience investigating the medical aspects of diving accidents for multiple governmental and private organizations. His most recent work has been on the diagnosis of decompression sickness and arterial gas embolism.
He has published extensively in the field of the pathophysiology of arterial gas embolism and is interested in the relationship between diving accidents and asthma as well as the mechanism of death associated with arterial gas embolism. He was the Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Undersea and Hyperbaric Medicine from 1995-2002. He is also one of the editors of the 5th Edition of Bennett and Elliott’s Physiology and Medicine of Diving which is one of three leading textbooks in the field of diving medicine. This was published in January 2003.
Dr. Neuman is on the American Board of Preventive Medicine committee responsible for formulating the Board Examination in Undersea and Hyperbaric Medicine and he is also the American College of Emergency Physician’s liaison to that committee. Dr. Neuman is a consultant to NASA and was a member of an Institute of Medicine (IOM) Committee on the medical aspects of exploratory class deep space missions which resulted in the IOM publication Safe Passage: Astronaut Care for Exploration Missions. He is a member of an IOM standing committee to advise NASA on extreme environments and medical planning for astronaut health care.
Dr. Neuman is an active diver and an “emeritus” PADI Instructor (#1149). He is board certified in internal medicine, pulmonary medicine, emergency medicine, undersea and hyperbaric medicine, and preventive medicine. He is currently on the full time faculty of the University of California San Diego, where he is the Associate Director of Emergency Medical Services and is the director of the Hyperbaric Medicine Program.
