Unusual Attitudes: My Medical and Rules of Flying

The obvious choice is Bob Stein, an old friend who I've seen since we instructed together at Cincinnati Aircraft back in the '60s. He's done a lot of good things for a lot of pilots for some 50 years and is legendary at Delta and Comair. Of course, there were others when I was a fed in the Chicago and Indianapolis FSDOs. I owe a lot to the guy in Chicago who gave me a lung capacity test "off the record." I was a two-plus-pack-a-day smoker; when I saw the results and realized that I'd probably be hauling an oxygen tank around for the last 10 years of my life, I threw the Parliament 100s and my cool Zippo lighter in his office trash can and went cold turkey. Back home it was by luck that the FAA had contracted with Dr. Stein to do all the physicals for inspectors in the Cincinnati FSDO. Well, except one woman inspector who threw a hissy fit and demanded her own aviation medical examiner, probably because he didn't make her climb on the scale. OK, OK, I'm trying to retract my claws, but this gal was a "fast track hire" with all the paper qualifications except she couldn't fly airplanes … didn't even like to fly airplanes. After (twice) failing a multiengine course at the FAA Academy, the academy simply eliminated the "pass" requirement. Maybe I'm just envious because within 10 years she was managing one of the largest FSDOs in the Southern region while, after 27 years and 11 months, I was doing pretty much the same thing I did the day I began. And that doesn't make any sense either, because I'm anything but "management material." Anyway, read on for more about Bob Stein.

First, though, there's another neat guy around here named John Held, a cardiologist who's a "go to" person in the aging aviator community — guys dealing with heart issues, and not the love affair variety. Well, who knows, maybe that too. John's as passionate and enthusiastic about the way hearts work (or don't) as he is about flying, and I'm passionate about anybody who's truly passionate about anything. His sidekick, Jennifer Selm, runs the office, flies airplanes and works magic in dealing with Oklahoma City on special issuances. So there are some definite pluses with this guy. He's a respected cardio guy, has a wonderfully dry sense of humor and is fun to talk to, nice looking (sure, that's important) and young enough to outlast me so I won't have to break in a new one. I guess the only serious reservation is that he sold a knock-your-socks-off gorgeous Waco to buy an A36. But, hey, we all have a dark side.

Even if you're from Idaho or Iowa, before you hang it up, treat yourself to a flight physical experience with AME, local coroner and Cessna 195 driver extraordinaire Bill Terrell. Time it right and Carol, his wife-nurse-office manager, is likely to feed you lunch in the kitchen of their neat country house/office just south of Hillsboro, Ohio. Bill is a physician in the very best sense of the word and would be my "real" doctor in a heartbeat except no pilot in his right mind combines both! His over-the-top sense of humor and easy, down-home personality are guaranteed to lower the blood pressure of nervous Nellie pilots facing the dreaded cuff and that infernal EKG contraption. Plus he's a helluva mechanic with a knack for designing and building better mousetraps, not to mention assorted 195 pieces and parts. After a long Air Force medical career, Bill came back home to practice and did FAA physicals for a bunch of the Airborne freight guys from nearby Wilmington, Ohio, until it closed last year. An AME who loves to fly, can keep a "shaky Jake" running and maintains close ties with the Civil Aviation Medical Institute (read "special issuance") is a good guy to know.

One of his Airborne pilot buddies (may they all be enjoying peace in new and better flying jobs) took a nasty cut on the chin when he tossed his flight bag into the overhead on a crew bus — and missed. It was a devilishly awkward area to bandage, but Bill told him to drop by because he had a solution. After some creative fiddling, he had extensively modified a jock strap that, when placed over the lower part of the face and hooked around the ears, held the dressing securely in place. Unfortunately, a nonpilot female patient was arriving for her first visit just as the man was leaving the office. She took one look at this guy wearing a jock strap around his ears and beat it back to her car, never to be seen again.

Look around and you'll find FAA docs who are enthusiastic aviators just about anywhere. But read that again … "Look around and find one." Not somebody who's "convenient" but who loves to fly as much as you do. An airplane nut who understands "where you're coming from," who doesn't believe pilots need to be supermen. You want to be able to discuss any potential problems or fears you have before ever putting a pen to the application. Don't withhold information or commit fraud on an "official government document," but be very careful about what you "say" on that form. Self-diagnosing a condition you "think" you have, like sleep apnea, chronic headaches or anxiety, can land you (figuratively and literally) in a world of hurt.

Enough with the advice. If I thought it would throw a monkey wrench in the works at Oklahoma City without annihilating my chances of ever getting another medical, I'd go to all three just for the hell of it. But this year it's going to be Bill Terrell, and the decision's pretty easy since the good Dr. Held is off somewhere in his Bonanza and Bob Stein is doing the semiretired thing more and more these days. Besides, I'm just not up to another examining room door episode. …

See, Bob Stein's office is the upper half of an aging, ticky tacky, split-level place he owns in Cincinnati. The place is a warren of little rooms and hallways presided over for the last 40 years by a gruff-voiced, softhearted, stately and splendid woman named Barbara.

The drill's pretty much the same as it is anywhere, with a few local variations. You begin in the bathroom where you produce a specimen and don a paper cape (at least the women do). Then it's a pilgrimage through the EKG, eye test and hearing rooms until you're perched on the examining room table, sometimes still clutching the cup of pee that Barbara forgot to collect. You shiver in the paper cape and play with tongue depressors and the reflex mallet until the good doctor appears to confirm you're semiwarm and breathing. Then you get down to the serious business of trading airport gossip and flying stories.

On my last visit, I waited an uncommonly long time on the table and finally decided they'd forgotten about me. So I opened the door and yelled out in the hallway for Barbara. Well, that is, I tried to open the door … but it was locked. They'd locked me in? Wait a minute … what did I put on that form? Did I check a really wrong box? Did I say anything about the noises? I rattled the doorknob and shouted for Barbara. After more doorknob rattling and louder shouts, Barbara arrived and said to stay cool and stand back; sometimes the door "acted up," but a good kick usually worked. Kicks, more rattling, heavier door pounding, more vigorous kicks, more voices but no joy. Now, with a receptionist, a nurse, two doctors and assorted patients from the waiting room assembled in the hallway, the dialogue went something like this:

From outside. Dr. Somebody: "Try turning the knob and pulling up at the same time." A deeper-voiced male patient: "OK, stand back while I give it a really hard shove." Dr. Stein, who owned the building: "Wait, be careful not to hurt the door." An assistant: "Remember when this happened last summer?" Barbara: "Oh, yeah, we tried everything and then that really nice Comair pilot took the hinges off." Dr. Stein: "Gee, it's a shame he isn't here now; does anybody know … "

From inside. "Hey, guys, how about a locksmith or maybe the landlord? … Oh, that's you, isn't it? Well, how about the fire department or police?"

I'm only mildly claustrophobic (like I hate MRIs) but this was a tiny room with one very small casement window high up near the ceiling over the examining table. So I started to practice yoga breathing then spied a louvered ventilation panel, maybe 1½ by 2 feet, at the bottom of the door with the screw heads on my side.

"Do you have a Phillips screwdriver?"

Much murmuring and bustling and then, "Yes."

"OK, send somebody kind of athletic around to the side of the building. See if he can climb that tree outside and pass it to me through the window." (I didn't say that the window was going to be a victim of the reflex mallet if it wouldn't open.)

So I climbed up tippy-toe on the table and cranked the window open far enough to retrieve a Phillips screwdriver flourished like Excalibur by a young man in the tree. I climbed down, unscrewed the panel and, thankful to be small, wriggled through the opening with little concern about dignity or modesty or the arrangement of my paper cape.

"Don't even think of coming near me with that blood pressure cuff. Just use the numbers from last year!"