migranes?
 

not sure if this is the right place for this, but i'll post anyway...
does anyone know if having a history of migranes, even if it hasn't happened for a long time, would preclude a person from joining the RAF as a WSO, or WSOp? thanks.

Yes.

:*:*:*:*

Who knows?

I think the basic answer to all these is avoid docs and quacks if at all possible at all times.

Having considered PN's reply over mine, I am in agreement.

Good luck in avoiding the quacks !

Migrains
 

I told a little porky and said I did not suffer from same. Certainly would never see a Doc unless extremely urgent or on an annual. Having arrived on a squadron I never knew if I had a migrain or a hang-over.

My daughter gets migranes. I have never suffered in my life.

Just blinding headaches like an iron band being tightened around my head or a heavy thumping inside, or even a gente one like now. No idea what causes them although there was a possible diagnosis several years ago.

The old annual confidential had a little box -DRINKS - that the boss could mark, Does Not Drink, Drinks moderately, Drinks heavily but sensibly, Drinks heavily and unwisely. I think this was the one line where the high score was for DHU. :}

A school friend of my daughter gets blinding migraine type symptoms after too much heading of the ball in football. Her uncle is a physio for a Premier League club and explained that it's due to compression of bones in the base of the skull. She's only 13/14, so it's unlikely to be from the drink....

Let me just suggest a possible scenario leading to the cause of the headaches.


The child heads the ball. Somewhere in the brain, a minute fault, or even just an unusual contact with its containment structure, causes a defensive reaction: constriction of the blood supply.

This is a life saving mechanism, but I believe it can also be the first phase of migraine.

Whether or not the real suffering is caused by a hormone that releases this constriction, is not relevant at the moment. It is the processed reaction that is the issue.

Another example is the musician that has had to give up the trumpet because of swelling of blood vessels in his or her brain. The horrible thing is, that in most of these cases, the mind will learn to fear the danger, and the very suggestion of the game...or instrument, is enough to cause the clamping.

Then we get to the era of unconnected response.

I believe that the sub-precessing is quite independent of our normal minds and can churn away, fretting about one problem or another, without letting the conscious mind in on the act. This means that the problem starts to occur at seemingly unconnected times.

So, in the case of heading the football, perhaps subsequent knocks were well within limits, but the one rather bad impact has led to a learned reaction.

Tut tut tut, the worlds finest trying to fudge the medical.

"Migraine" is a subjective term, often used broadly by medics. If the diagnosis is in doubt, question it, stressing to your gp ,the importance of an accurate "labelling" of your problem to your future.

I suspect "true" migraine is a no no, although treatments and preventative measures usually work well.:)

Accurate diagnosis is the name of the game.

A good going migraine is debilitating and those that suffer them understand pretty well that they should not be flightcrew.

RAF and CAA consider any migraine an automatic ban on flying.

The FAA looks at these on a case by case basis.

<---any advertisement appearing in this sidebox is there courtesy of PPRuNe and is not an endorsement by me for any product or service.

if migranes were on a medical record, but classed as non continuing by a doctor, would this still preclude a person from aircrew? is there any way to check before OASC, whether they would allow it?

Did you read this?
R. V. Johnston and M. D. O’Brien
Neurological Disease at 30 000 Feet –What is an Acceptable Risk for your Pilot?
You can download it from pn.bmjournals.com
It says that migraine isn't always a reason of unfitness, it depends from the frequency of attacks.
Bye
ACIDO

Interesting article-'specially the bit about risk management.

When people publish papers like this, I often wonder if they have a clue about the environment that's being considered.

It must be manifestly obvious to anyone that has observed a patient in the middle of a bad attack, that it is a totally disabling malaise. A sufferer of Classical Migraine simply should not make a career in commercial aviation.

However...I have suggested in the past, that say, a teenager--that has one, or perhaps two episodes and then none for some years--might be at no more risk than an older person that is going through a traumatic phase of their life. Migraine strikes at people when they least need it.

The 'triggers' like chocolate and cheese, are perhaps little more than that: a shock to a system that is already primed. In my opinion, it is getting rid of the route cause that will be the answer.

I have just finished a book about perhaps the world's first neurologist. I'll perhaps put my thoughts about this in a post when I get a moment. But for now, it mentions perhaps the first really well documented account of a migraine sufferer, Lady Anne Conway. mid 1600s. She was a very intelligent woman by the sound of it, but her introspective nature, again in my opinion, may have been the reason for her repeated attacks. It followed a pattern: the mind determining a threat, and taking the first step to causation. In other words, and this is an important point, worrying about the possibility of an attack, caused migraine.

Dear Loose Rivets,

Dr. Johnston works for CAA and in that article seems to describe the criteria followed by the same CAA. If I correctly understood, this means that CAA could consider issuing a first class medical certificate also in some cases of migraine.
Please, tell me if I'm wrong.

ACIDO