Ladies and gentlemen
This information was available a couple of years ago in the proposal for comment, which I and I believe the UK CAA commented on. Before EASA took over the UK CAA were very close to allowing the use of SSRI drugs based a draft protocol. However, politics kicked in and they lost their nerve despite only needing one more committee to approve the change.
As for EASA Med Part 1, it is true that the proposal will provide some flexibility in the use of SSRI drugs and is likely to follow the protocol proposed by the CAA, which in turn was developed from the experience gained from our friends down under who have allowed the use of these drugs for over 10 years. Now for those who are really interested there is a long term study, which reports little or no difference in accidents rates by pilots who take these drugs to those who do not. Hence the US FAA has also recently agreed to relax the rules, all be bit with a few more restrictions.
Assuming the CAA protocol will be followed in some form, you will need to meet a number of obvious criteria to regain your medical certificate (class 1 or 2). These include a suitable report(s) on your condition, restricted to using specific SSRI drug types (I believe there are four or five approved) and also provide follow up evaluations depending on the medical certificate.
Now for the sad bit.... I recently wrote to the CAA again on the subject and their position with the EASA rules, plus I also followed up with a phone call with them to discuss the matter further and unfortunately they refused to provide any advice until the EASA rules come into force in July...
Something to do about local interpretation of the rules (i.e. one country might allow one thing and another might not...). This seems a little strange to me because these medical standards are meant to be common to all.
So like the rest of us I still need to wait until July/August before I know if I can regain my full medical back.
Don't you just hate red tape....
