Airline Pilot Central Forums - Pilot Mental Health

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Quote:

Originally Posted by Supercubbin (Post 3787133)

It’s not the job that causes anxiety and depression, it’s the lifestyle associated with it. Inconsistent sleep/wake times, disruption to circadian rhythm, poor diet and lack of exercise are all major contributors to depression and anxiety and there is a lot of good scientific data to support it. Add in a few interpersonal issues at home and you’ve got a pilot at risk of chronic depression. I always make it a priority to get good food, sleep and exercise on layovers, but some trips have consistently short layovers with at least one circadian swap. A disruption as simple as that can mess up your psyche for a few days, especially if you do a few of these types of trips back to back. I love my job and wouldn’t ever want to do anything else, but I’m also keenly aware of the physical toll this lifestyle takes.

Of course, and these things are cumulative. I mean to say well "I've done this and I've done that and there are starving children in Africa and I don't have depression" doesn't make it fact and true for everybody else. Everybodies situation is different. It is something to acknowledge and be aware of. If it wasn't, then there wouldn't have been the approval of the SSRI protocol in 2010 (because there were in fact A LOT of pilots suffering from depression). It is finally becoming more mainstream and accepted (which is good).

Quote:

Originally Posted by JohnBurke (Post 3787137)

"Jet lag" doesn't cause a debilitating mental or emotional condition. Nor do "endless hotels."

You may have missed the assertion and point of the original post in this thread (the subject of the thread), if you say that "nobody is saying airline jobs cause mental illness." It seems that's exactly what the original poster said:

What's the longest you've ever spent in "endless hotels," that's caused such hardship?

Like I said, it is one piece of an overall picture. Jet lag does in fact cause disruptions in mood and cognitive health. When I went through night vision goggle training, we were educated on the negative affects of night flying and circadian disruption, and its effect on mood and mental well being. The airline environment does in fact have an effect on mental health and well being. If you can't accept that then agree to disagree.

Controlling expectations…

A lot of people seem to believe that antidepressants are some sort of "magic bullet." They aren't. Used appropriately they are certainly a help, but thei efficacy is nowhere near 100%.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK361016/

An excerpt:

Quote:

How effectively do antidepressants relieve the symptoms?

There are a lot of different medications for treating depression. But it's difficult to predict how well a particular medication will help an individual. So doctors often first suggest taking a drug that they consider to be effective and relatively well tolerated. If it doesn't help as much as expected, it's possible to switch to a different medication. Sometimes a number of different drugs have to be tried before you find one that works.

Studies show that the benefit generally depends on the severity of the depression: The more severe the depression, the greater the benefits will be. In other words, antidepressants are effective against chronic, moderate and severe depression. They don't help in mild depression.

The various antidepressants have been compared in many studies. Overall, the commonly used tricyclic antidepressants (SSRIs and SNRIs) were found to be equally effective. Studies involving adults with moderate or severe depression have shown the following:

Without antidepressants: About 20 to 40 out of 100 people who took a placebo noticed an improvement in their symptoms within six to eight weeks.
With antidepressants: About 40 to 60 out of 100 people who took an antidepressant noticed an improvement in their symptoms within six to eight weeks.

In other words, antidepressants improved symptoms in about an extra 20 out of 100 people.

Antidepressants can also relieve long-term symptoms of chronic depressive disorder (dysthymia) and chronic depression, and help make them go away completely.

An antidepressant can already have an effect within one or two weeks. But it may take longer for the symptoms to improve.

Depressive symptoms can also be treated with a combination of two medications. This might lead to a noticeable improvement. In some people it can take a long time for a medication to start helping. Other people still have symptoms even after trying several different medications. You can then discuss the other possible treatment options with your doctor.

Go to:

How well can antidepressants prevent relapses?

Antidepressants are usually taken for one to two years, and sometimes longer, to prevent relapses. Relapse prevention may be a good idea for people who

have already had several relapses,
absolutely want to avoid a relapse, or
have chronic depression.

Studies involving adults have shown that taking commonly used antidepressants such as TCAs, SSRIs or SNRIs can lower the risk of relapses, but can't completely prevent them:

Without preventive treatment: About 50 out of 100 people who took a placebo had a relapse within one to two years.
With preventive treatment: About 23 out of 100 people who took an antidepressant had a relapse within one to two years.

In other words, taking an antidepressant over a long period of time successfully prevented a relapse in an average of 27 out of 100 people.

If anything, this job helps my mental health.

Fly to London, workout, happy hour with the crew, sleep, then fly home.

Plenty of non-airline types are basket cases that I don’t think this Cadillac of a job is really contributing to it. Depending on the job of course. Us airline peeps on the left side of the pond are getting paid quite well with excellent work rules.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Excargodog (Post 3787287)

If you're loking for a magic pill to solve all your problems, that may not pan out for you.

But if you're pro-actively taking control of your life and health, your prospects are pretty good, and meds can help get you started in the right direction.

There has long been a trend toward overmedicating mental and emotional conditions, rather than treating the root, and much of the time, it's not chemical. But therein runs the schism between psychology and psychiatry.

A disturbing effort seems to be a growing undercurrent that wants to legitimize mental and emotional conditions to make them paletable and acceptable for flight, the idea being that pilots will reveal them if they think they can fly with that condition. In many cases, thy shouldn't be flying with that condition; the FAA. knows it. The pilot knows it. The pilot hides it to prevent the FAA from knowing about it, and grounding the pilot, when the pilot should be grounded.

The FAA is concerned about medication, but in all cases, the chief concern is the underlying condition for which the medication is taken.

Far more go without medication than with; the undiagnosed or untreated go absent aids or a course of therapy, whether pharmaceutical, counseling, or otherwise. It does no one any good to explain away the condition as the result of a flying career. The blam game only goes so far, and does nothing for diagnosis, let alone treatment. Aviation Induced Divorce Syndrome is not a thing; it's a farce spoken among those too weak to own up to the responsibility for the fialure of their own marriage, and the inability to own it leads to failure to move past, and anger...which turned inward, is depression, and worse. The career is an easy scapegoat. The same is true of porn addiction, gambling addiction, alcohol, drugs, etc. The career is low-hanging fruit, but to hide behind the fringe of hours and hotels and time on the road is to lie to one's self, and a failure to own. The victim of self is the apologist, and the apology is stale, but rampant.

Turned me into a newt. A newt with a sockpuppet & an iPad

Quote:

Go live a life of poverty, try working for a living, visit a land of pestilence, famine, and suffering, and then come backt to tell me how hard it is working in a first world airline or aviation environment.

Mental health is not exclusively but primarily a result of the luxury of having First World problems.
Orphaned child soldiers in the Sudan don’t have time for this.

Quote:

Originally Posted by TiredSoul (Post 3787385)

Mental health is not exclusively but primarily a result of the luxury of having First World problems.
Orphaned child soldiers in the Sudan don’t have time for this.

Quite so.

We live in a world of 'likes.'

Look at me, and see me sad. Celebrate my sorrow, and feel for me.

Meanwhile, the world that be damned, that hasn't starved, burns. Few in the 'like' world cry for that.

Quote:

Originally Posted by JohnBurke (Post 3787413)

so if it’s such a cake job would you contend we are overpaid?