Spontaneous Pneumothorax and VAT pleurodesis
 

Dear all,

I had a spontaneous pneumothorax on my left lung. I am 43 years old skinny and tall . It happened twice within a week, and after the second time I had the VAT pleurodesis surgery. I know there are few threads here about this condition, but I was wondering if anyone has had it recently?

Trying to figure out the best way to recover and go through the hoops of re-certification.

Any personal experiences and advices are much appreciated.

Stay healthy!

Usually, the feds are looking for 3 months without problems after a VATS for a spontaneous pneumo.
you’ll probably be deferred by your AME, but if you’ve got your ducks in a row, you can submit all the stuff you need to CAMI essentially concurrently with your deferral, and you stand a good chance of having your medical back within a few weeks thereafter.

Thanks for the reply. Yeah I've heard the 3 months wait time. As of now my medical is not defered but I am not flying , so I should be ok till my next one.

Have you had the VAT pleurodesis before or do you know other pilots who may have had that? I wonder how long after the surgery they were able to recover and feel normal especially when they were back flying the line?

Thanks

I’m an Ame who’s a pilot and a surgeon, so I’ve seen and done a lot from many angles with regard to the problem. Generally recovery is fairly rapid in otherwise healthy people.
feel free to pm me if you have specific questions.

Hi, I had 3 spontaneous pneumothoraxes within a 12 month period in 1983. I had the pleurodesis procedure after the third episode & have had no recurrence since. I had probably fully recovered by the six week mark, but I still took it relatively easy for probably the first 3 months. I wasn't flying for a living at that stage so there was no rush to get my Class 1 medical back here in Australia...