Vertigo advice please.
At the weekend I was chatting to a friend who is a member of the same vintage motorcycle club as me. When he learnt that I was a commercial pilot he wanted to ask my advice on his problem and flying.
In short when he was 6 years old (some 60 years ago) he had his ears syringed. It was very painful, he complained that he could feel liquid going down his throat and received a clout from his father for whinging! It turned out that both eardrums had been ruptured during the process, his ears subsequently became very infected and were badly damaged. He has been almost completely deaf most of his life and due to the damage suffers what he refers to as vertigo but may well be labyrinthitis. He has tablets to counteract this problem. He drives but if he is a passenger he has to sit in the front seat and he also rides his old motorcycles but says he has to 'concentrate' to avoid the condition. Sea travel makes him very ill.
His son lives in Australia and he recently missed his son's wedding being too scared to fly in case the condition manifested itself when flying. He tells me that a bad attack can cripple him for several days.
His question to me was did I think flying would be likely to cause the condition to manifest itself. In honesty I have no idea. A reasonably smooth flight I would guess not but moderate or even severe turbulence I am not so sure.
He is a great chap who has stoically and cheerfully got on with life since what sounds like diabolically negligent treatment damaged his ears so badly as a child.
I would love to be able to point him in the right direction to get accurate and sound advice so would be grateful for any experience or advice anybody can offer.