Blood Pressure Levels of Active Pilots Compared with Those of Air Traffic Controllers

摘要

Currently some 15,212 active airmen are certified to fly with a diagnosis of hypertension. Federal Aviation Administration blood pressure standards for certification of airmen for considered to be quite liberal; however, recent FAA policy further liberalized medications and dosages allowed in certification of airmen. Since limited information is available concerning the recorded blood pressures of airmen, a systematic sample of active pilots was extracted from automated medical files maintained by the Aeromedical Certification Branch of the Civil Aeromedical Institute for descriptive purposes as well as to compare with a sample of air traffic controllers, given the continuing interest in the relationship of stress of air traffic control work. This is a pre-strike ATCS sample. Distributions of blood pressure by age were compared by using conventional nonparametric techniques for 10-year age intervals. Data were also compared with general population findings. Prevalence of hypertension is greater in the general United States population than found with any of these groups reported. Prevalence of borderline and definite hypertension is seen to increase with age for all groups studied. Prevalence of any degree of hypertension is lower for airline pilots than the all-airmen group or the air traffic controller group. Of the three airmen groups, prevalence of hypertension is highest for the air traffic controllers, but the influence of more liberal waiver and retention criteria for air traffic controllers is an important reason for the excess.