View Full Version : Flying with a burst Ear Drum.
Smokie
16th Sep 2003, 18:31
One of our Captains is allegedly flying with a burst ear drum.
He was off for about 4-5 weeks, is this long enough for it to heal properly?
I realise that there are differing types of truama, pinprick, tear, etc.
However, it does seem to be a bit premature for such an early return to flying duties.
When the levy breaks there is no place to hide.
Smokie
12th Oct 2003, 09:52
I take it then, that everybody would be quite happy knowing that
the guy or girl in the other seat had a burst eardrum.
Would they really be happy to fly /operate with their colleague, knowing that there was a potential Med Emergencey in the offing ?
..the echo's of the distant shore's come willowing across the bay...
A collegue of mine had one recently, he said the pain was so bad there was no way he could go flying until it had healed. he was off for 4 or 5 weeks, he has some scarring still of the eardrum and requires additional audomitry at his next medical
Bad medicine
13th Oct 2003, 09:46
There is quite a lot of good information on this thread:
http://www.pprune.org/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=99625
Cheers,
BM
Smokie
14th Oct 2003, 04:02
BM.
Thanks, some good info there and polite discussion too.
Another collegue of mine a few years back also had a perforated ear drum. It actually took 3 months for his to heal and a lot longer before he was back on the roster.
As I said earlier it depends on the type of injury I suppose.
the distant ship's smoke on the horizon............
thats the thing with medical stuff, a lot of it is perspective and people always exagerate "nearly took my arm off" could really be just a scratch. So maybe his ears were not as bad as was initially made out. You get what i mean.
an interesting (or dull) point about ears is the ol flying with a cold issue. Whats the worst that could happen.... well death, Happened to a chap I met once old ww2 pilot, burst eardrum after flying with a cold (there's a war on dont you know, hitler dont stop cos you got the sniffels so get in that aeroplane now) anyhow , fluid built up in the porus bone behind the ear, got infected, spread via his blood to the brain and lo and behold Meningitis. very lucky to survive, exceptional really in 1943 and never flew again. was an Aviation doctor when i met him.
Gerund
18th Oct 2003, 03:59
For heavens sake...what's the problem?
A burst eardrum is not such a big deal. A traumatic burst can be extremely painful, but I had a bust once and only knew about it when I tried to clear my ears, and one ear cleared and the other just went on, and on, and on, with a faint whooshing sound.
Yes, it had perforated, how I know not. It healed up without me ever being aware of any hearing or other problem (just kept off diving for a few weeks - didn't want any water in there). From a flying perspective the relatively small pressure changes, equivalent to climbing to the top of a small mountain, and coming back down again, never had any effect.
It just healed up without me ever being aware of any problem, flying or otherwise.
One mustn't get these things out of perspective......what exactly is meant to be the big deal??