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Alcohol question

Old 04-17-2009, 10:31 PM
  #1  
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ok quick question I got. Lets say a very good person clean record(no arrests), no dependence record for illicit substance and alcohol in his/her medical history, gets hospitalized because he/she party to hard one night and went to the hospital with acute alcohol intoxication, just with that case means denial of his/her 1st medical when that person goes back for his/her annual check up? or what would the steps be taken by the ame to try to get the persons 1st class med
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Old 04-17-2009, 10:55 PM
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Here's the first question I'd ask:

On your hospital admission/discharge paperwork, or other orders (if you have them)...

was that "acute alcohol intoxication" specifically listed ANYWHERE as a diagnosis or reason for your visit?
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Old 04-18-2009, 07:41 AM
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in my friend's case yes when i picked her up from the hospitalwas acute alcohol intoxication further treatment was to eat and rest up. i signed her discharge paper.we are both trying to get into a school to fly. she is very afraid that with that case shes not gonna be able to get her medical and not fly at all
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Old 04-18-2009, 10:00 AM
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Are you in the US?

If so you are probably OK. The bad news is that you probably will need to report that when you apply for an FAA medical, and they will probably require a substance abuse evaluation (at your expense).

I would assume that if this is the first and only time time that this has happened and you are young and not actually addicted to anything they will determine that it was a lapse in judgment not an addiction/abuse problem.

But you now have one strike...a DUI or other subsequent substance abuse problems could get your medical revoked. Be extra careful in the future.
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Old 04-18-2009, 10:03 AM
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Originally Posted by javelin View Post
Here's the first question I'd ask:

On your hospital admission/discharge paperwork, or other orders (if you have them)...

was that "acute alcohol intoxication" specifically listed ANYWHERE as a diagnosis or reason for your visit?
I guarantee you that if she went in for that, they documented it somewhere. Don't kid yourself that you can pretend there are no records.

Of course if the medical service provider was NOT your usual provider and not billed to your insurance HMO, it would be very hard for the FAA to find out about this incident. But you never know...
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Old 04-18-2009, 07:29 PM
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Originally Posted by rickair7777 View Post
I guarantee you that if she went in for that, they documented it somewhere. Don't kid yourself that you can pretend there are no records.

Of course if the medical service provider was NOT your usual provider and not billed to your insurance HMO, it would be very hard for the FAA to find out about this incident. But you never know...
I'm not kidding anyone. Though if they treated the symptoms as an injury rather than that alcohol intoxication, there's a chance that the whole incident didnt even go down as an alchohol incident.

Rickair's right, if there was "alcohol intoxication" on ANY of the paperwork, it WILL need to be reported on the medical and a DUI would be REALLY BAD.

BUT. if it was an injury treated and "acute alcohol [anything]" wasn't specifically listed on any hospital documentation, they don't have anything. So, look at what the hospital has over the admission case!
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Old 04-18-2009, 07:33 PM
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she'll get a medical. but anything further will be a larger issue.
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Old 02-06-2019, 12:20 PM
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Default Similar situation....

I actually have a similar circumstance. I was out drinking with my wife and friends on a weekend, away from work. I drank far too much and ended up on one of those pay scooters. Don't remember what happened but fairly quickly I fell off and knocked myself out. My wife and friends called 911 and I ended up in the hospital with mild Traumatic Brain Injury. So obviously I'm dealing with that issue. (I would have reported this to the FAA as its a pretty serious injury and I wasn't going to be able to return to work anytime soon. However, the hospital was a military hospital in my city and someone reported it to the FAA for me.... how nice of them.) It's been a few months and I am fine now, so the TBI thing is just a waiting game with the FAA at this point and I'm OK with that, I'm on LTD and I have gone back to work at my old airline as a pilot recruiter too.

I had an AME that I got through the HIMS guy at our union. They have collected and submitted all my relevant paperwork. I have a clean driving record, and a clean medical history. I went ahead and went to a HIMS Psychiatrist who said with this incident and my admission that I am occasionally hungover that I qualify for "substance abuse disorder - mild." Which is a DSM term, and apparently not an FAA term. I have been briefed on the whole "dependence" definition in the eyes of the FAA. But in my opinion the shoe doesn't fit here. I drank far too excessively and clearly couldn't handle it, knocking myself out. That's abuse, for sure, but I don't see how it can be construed as dependence.

My question is, will I be forced to go into HIMS, and/or get monitored and/or tested for a few years? Everyone I talk to seems to think yes, but this is a strange circumstance. (By everyone I mean my original HIMS AME who had to retire due to health issues, a new HIMS AME and a guy at AMAS) They always refer back to DUI cases they know of, but this was not a DUI and there was no legal action involved.

The kicker in all of this is that my hospital paperwork shows my BAC on admission and it is (and seems suspiciously) VERY high. I have picked through the paperwork with a fine-tooth comb and can find no blood work to verify this BAC. It's just listed in the general discharge comments (along with multiple instances in which they incorrectly called me a 28 year old male.) I found blood work from the next day with a BAC that's still pretty high, but nothing from my actual admission to verify this seemingly contrived claim.

Last edited by dmk1984; 02-06-2019 at 12:55 PM.
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Old 02-06-2019, 03:42 PM
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Originally Posted by dmk1984 View Post
I actually have a similar circumstance. I was out drinking with my wife and friends on a weekend, away from work. I drank far too much and ended up on one of those pay scooters. Don't remember what happened but fairly quickly I fell off and knocked myself out. My wife and friends called 911 and I ended up in the hospital with mild Traumatic Brain Injury. So obviously I'm dealing with that issue. (I would have reported this to the FAA as its a pretty serious injury and I wasn't going to be able to return to work anytime soon. However, the hospital was a military hospital in my city and someone reported it to the FAA for me.... how nice of them.) ... I found blood work from the next day with a BAC that's still pretty high, but nothing from my actual admission to verify this seemingly contrived claim.
So you had an accident driving while intoxicated, ended up with a TBI, had blood work in the ER that was “suspiciously” high, to the extent that it was STILL high the next day? And you somehow believe because you were never really CHARGED with a DUI that the THREE physicians you have talked to can’t possibly be correct in saying you are headed for HIMS - if indeed you are even THAT fortunate?

Last edited by Excargodog; 03-26-2019 at 03:47 PM.
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Old 02-06-2019, 03:52 PM
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What he said ^^^

Better give HIMS a shot, I suspect that either your drinking or flying days are through, one or the other.
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