Gotta give props to the FAA... (no pun intended)

[skydiver30960 0]

And I'm actually not being sarcastic.

I had a little hiccup with my most recent third class medical certification renewal. No biggie, just something that my PCP and I needed to work out.

I ended up placing a handful of calls to the Medical Certification department. I might have been dealing with an outside contractor since the guy always introduced himself as "Eric with CNI" or some acronym like that. In nearly all cases the call was answered quickly, they spoke to me in English rather than FAA-ese and gave me honest answers to my questions.

The situation has been resolved, I'm (once again) certified, and will be back on tandems as soon as I can get recurrent.

I have no misconceptions about the FAA or any other government agency, trust me. But I just wanted to take a moment to give credit to a department (or at least one guy) who actually didn't fit the reputation of the inflexible, unworkable FAA.

If you ever get in a jam with your Medical Certificate, call and ask for Eric. He's da man.

For example, not that I'm speaking from experience or anything, but you might want to call him BEFORE you report any new medications to the FAA, just to find out what they might think about them. Again, not speaking from experience or anything...

Elvisio "ramp checks still suck, though" Rodriguez

[tombuch 0]

If you are a member of AOPA you can also check their on-line database of medications, and can even complete a pre-FAA-medical application that will flag any unusual conditions or medications long before you get to the AME. It makes the process painless. And if, by chance, there is a problem, their telephone support people will help guide you to resolution. Not a bad deal for $39.00.

And oh yeah, most of my FAA experiences have been pretty positive.

Tom Buchanan
Instructor Emeritus
Comm Pilot MSEL,G
Author: JUMP! Skydiving Made Fun and Easy

[BIGUN 1,307]

There's also a free website http://www.leftseat.com/medcat1.htm updated fairly regularly.

Nobody has time to listen; because they're desperately chasing the need of being heard.

[skydiver30960 0]

Quote

If you are a member of AOPA you can also check their on-line database of medications, and can even complete a pre-FAA-medical application that will flag any unusual conditions or medications long before you get to the AME. It makes the process painless. And if, by chance, there is a problem, their telephone support people will help guide you to resolution. Not a bad deal for $39.00.

And oh yeah, most of my FAA experiences have been pretty positive.

Unfortunately, the AOPA website was wrong on this one. When all this started, I consulted a buddy of mine who was an AOPA member and checked the list and showed that the medication I was interested in was an "approved medication". So, I joined AOPA to get access to the info myself, printed out the list, and called up the FAA ready to lay it to them. But, when I talked to them, i.e. Eric, he checked and said:

1.) According to the records HE had, the medication was NOT approved, and would not be approved under appeal;

2.) It was the FAA lists that decided what was approved and what was not approved, not the AOPA lists (he said it nicely, but that's what he said);

3.) He didn't know why the AOPA list would be wrong, but that didn't change anything anyhow (again, said nicely).

So... that didn't work out so well. I spent my money to join AOPA, so I'm going to get in touch with them to see if they have any suggestions or other possibilties for appeal they may suggest, but in the end to get by the FAA I had to quit taking the medication.

Elvisio "oh well" Rodriguez

[skydiver30960 0]

Quote

There's also a free website http://www.leftseat.com/medcat1.htm updated fairly regularly.

While not listed by name, the class of medication I was taking is listed as not approved by the FAA.

Elvisio "thanks for the source" Rodriguez