MJB68

Can somebody educate me on how a diagnosis of sleep apnea would affect your medical? Wife says I snore alot and wants me to go do a sleep study, but I'm hesitant to as I've heard it could be a grounding item if the doc tells you you've got sleep apnea. I'd rather not find out after the fact. Heck, I'm sleeping fine! She's the one with the issue with my snoring, not me.

Dog Breath

This is a pretty good source of information for many medical conditions.

Sleep apnea

MJB68

Excellent! Thanks.

TurboDog

I can speak from experience. I wound up at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, MN for a week and after a weeks worth of tests for other symptoms the doctor wanted to put me through a sleep study. Long story short, the study showed that I had pretty bad obstructive sleep apnea. On average 26 times per hour I would stop breathing for 19 seconds per episode. Obviously this grounded me instantly. Make sure before you get tested, if you decide to, that you talk it over with your AME. Once diagnosed with sleep apnea, the examiner is forced to report the findings to the FAA. The FAA has certain tolerances for Apnea as far as treatment being needed and what's acceptable. Weight loss alone is not enough treatment for the FAA. I wound up having surgery to get my tonsils out along with septoplasty on my nose to remove some bone spurs and straightening of my septum. After the worst surgery of my life I was required to wait at least a month( 2months recommended) before a follow up sleep study is required to see the benifit. Yes, that was all done in one surgery. With the surgery and use of a CPAP machine as treatment, the FAA said that my post surgery apnea was within workable tolerance provided that I did a MWT(maintenence of Wakefulness Test) once a year for 3 years to prove that I was actually getting sound sleep at night. The MWT is about the most boring thing you will ever do. You show up at the sleep clinic at 6:00 am. They hook you up with wires and machines and then you sit on a bed in a dark room for 30 to 40 minutes and you are told not to go to sleep. You have to just sit there and sit still. After your first session then you go out into a waiting area, or in a bedroom similar to a hotel room for 2 hours before your next dark sit. You do this dark sit for four times repeated every 2 hours and then you are done. The key is to prove that you are getting enough sleep at night that you don't fall asleep during the day. The test sucks, but if you really want to fly at this point you will make sure you don't fall asleep. After 3 years the FAA finally sent me a letter saying that I was no longer required to take this test. I didn't require a special issuance medical anymore, with the honor system in place that I will consult my AME if I notice the apnea resurface as a problem.

I know this all sounds scary to any pilot for fear of losing a medical for a while. For me though it was a no brainer. Sleep apnea CAN KILL YOU. I would rather be alive without a medical than dead because I was stubborn.

Many doctors will tell you that lots of overweight people have sleep apnea, however they don't know it because they haven't had a reason to get tested. Usually a spouse will complain that they can't sleep because of your snoring, or you just don't feel rested in the morning will lead you to look further.

Good luck with your decision and remember to consult a pilot friendly AME before proceding with any procedures or tests. PM me and I can give you my AME's contact info if you have questions. He is very well versed on the topic and has worked many cases with the FAA military and civilian.

MongoEP3

Sleep apnea has become the medical condition de jour in the military. Partly due to the 50% disability rating, partly due to advancing medical research, and I'm sure partly due to political influence from industry. Sleep studies are expensive, and from what I can see, very profitable.

I agree with all that Turbo said. Be careful what you ask for in a diagnosis, but the health effects of sleep apnea are serious and should be considered strongly.

I was diagnosed by the Navy in 2007, had surgery (agree, worst experience of my life, and it didn't work), underwent cognitive test at NAMI, and was ultimately granted a medical waiver.

I was at the two years to retirement mark in OCT '14. Given my sleep apnea, and all of the talk of the FAA mandating sleep studies based on BMI, I wanted to get the process started so any potential airline employment wasn't being held up, as well as be able to illustrate that I had held a 1st class medical with this condition for a little while. I have heard rumors of nine month waits... As stated above, the AME has to report it to the FAA. Sleep apnea is a disqualifying condition for all FAA medical certificates. You will not walk out of the office with a medical. I received a certified letter from the FAA a week or two later spelling out what they needed for review, and explained my medical was not denied (at that time). There is a laundry list of things they may want. For me, they wanted a print out of my CPAP machine and a letter from my sleep doctor.

A nurse at my sleep doctors office misunderstood the instructions and faxed only a printout of my CPAP. In addition to no letter, the printout only covered about three weeks and had some detrimentally skewing data that brought the numbers below the desired level. (I was deployed and my old machine broke, so only a short period of time with the new machine. Military duties woke me up after a couple of hours of sleep four days out of 21, driving the average use time down below the FAA desired six hours per night).

After I saw what the nurse did, I rescheduled an appointment a week or two later, had them re-run the CPAP numbers and asked the Dr to write a letter. Unfortunately, they don't spell out what they want the doctor to address very well. She wrote something like, "the patient is responding very well to CPAP treatment." She made a comment to me along the lines of 'I don't know what they want. How do I know if you're safe to fly an airplane?' More than early discussions with AN (not necesarily yours) AME, a discussion with the Dr regarding what should be addressed would be helpful. The AME, or even calling the FAA might help regarding the issues to be addressed. I included a letter explaining the previous bad data, and included that I had been medically cleared to fly combat mission in the Navy since 2007 with no side effects and mailed everything off.

A few days later, I received another certified letter from the FAA. Such a pain because I have to physically go to the Post Office which is located in the heart of the ghetto (and one can't carry a firearm into the post office), deal with the lovely people there. I digress. This letter said they still needed a letter from my doctor (which I had just mailed) and a copy of my sleep study. I was worried that they wanted a new sleep study because my last one was five years ago. It's not a hard thing, you just sleep, but it's a pain in the ass... It's expensive, but my military medical would cover that... I called the FAA to find out what they wanted, and they said they didn't have a copy of any sleep study and just needed a copy of my most recent one. I mailed a copy off and hadn't heard anything back for a few weeks.

I called the FAA yesterday to see if there was any status, or if they needed anything else since our correspondence seemed to be passing in the mail. The lady I spoke with was very nice and helpful. She informed me that my medical was approved a few days earlier. I asked her the date of issue (OCT when I saw the AME, or DEC when it was issued). She said OCT, but it is a one year clearance. Next OCT, I should anticipate the FAA wanting another letter from the doctor and another CPAP printout.

My airline career aspirations remain alive...

mike734

I had surgery to straighten out a deviated septum, remove pollups and turbinates and open up the sinus cavities. I get it when the previous posters say it was the worst surgery in their lives but it was well worth it. It's the recovery that was a drag. The surgeon has to clean out the sinuses every two days by essentially picking your nose with various clamps. You've never seen such huge boogers. But there is a certain relief when he pulls them out. You can breath again.

As uncomfortable as the recovery procedure is, it's not particularly painful and it's great to have working sinuses again. In that respect, it was the best surgery I've ever had. LASIK is a close second.

N9373M

Did the overnight sleep study, diagnosis - Sleep apnea. Now I'm grounded.

Went on CPAP

Did another overnight sleep study, this time with the CPAP. "Passed" test, back to flying.

I could have left it there, but I did not want to be tied to the CPAP, so I had the UP3 surgery. Allow recovery time, have yet another overnight sleep study without CPAP to see if the surgery worked. It did - now able to fly without lugging the CPAP where ever I go.

Would you rather die? SA is not something to dismiss. You don't know you're sleeping fine, only the overnight test will tell you that.

Good luck - PM if you have any Q's