A 5-year-old boy is dead after a hyperbaric chamber he was inside exploded at a medical facility Friday in Troy, Michigan, police and fire officials said.
The unidentified victim was inside the chamber, a pressurized container that contains 100% oxygen, when it suddenly exploded just before 8 a.m. at The Oxford Center, located at 165 Kirts Blvd.
The explosion caused a fire to break out inside the chamber’s room. It is unclear what sparked the explosion and the subsequent fire did not spread to the rest of the facility, police and fire officials said.
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Police and fire officials said that the boy, from Royal Oak, was dead inside the chamber when they arrived on the scene.
His mother, who was inside the room, suffered injuries to her arm, police said.
Troy Police Lt. Ben Hancock described the explosion as a “very sad incident” and said that such an incident is rare.
“We’re not familiar with responding to one of these recently,” Hancock said. “Again, [a] horrible, tragic incident, that we don’t want to ever respond to.”
A hyperbaric chamber contains 100% oxygen, which is up to three times the amount of oxygen than in a normal room, the officials said.
“The presence of such a high amount of oxygen in a pressurized environment can make it extremely combustible,” Lt. Keith Young from the Troy Fire Department said. “Our initial research shows that this is not a common incident, and the scene remains under active investigation.”
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It is unclear what condition the boy had that necessitated him to be inside the chamber, which is used to provide hyperbaric oxygen therapy (HBOT). A typical chamber holds one person and requires the patient to lie down in a tube-shaped device that looks like an MRI machine and breathe oxygen.
HBOY is well known for treating scuba and deep-sea divers affected by the rapid change in pressure around them, according to the FDA. The devices are also used to treat a variety of other health problems, including carbon monoxide poisoning, diabetic foot ulcers, cerebral palsy, anemia, infection of the skin and bone, as well as vision loss.
Such devices require FDA clearance to ensure that they are approved to be used as intended and are safe and effective.
In a statement to the Detroit Free Press, The Oxford Center spokesman Andrew Kistner wrote that the cause of the explosion is unknown.
“This morning, a fire started inside of a hyperbaric oxygen chamber. The child being treated in that chamber did not survive and the child’s mother was injured,” the statement reads.
“The safety and well-being of the children we serve is our highest priority. Nothing like this has happened in our more than 15 years of providing this type of therapy. We… will participate in all of the investigations that now need to take place.”
In May 2009, an explosion of a pressurized oxygen chamber killed a 4-year-old and his 62-year-old grandmother. Authorities said a blast dislodged a tube attached to the hyperbaric chamber, which resulted in an explosion and flash fire, according to CBS.
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