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FAA & BMI: MUCH AD0-doo about nothing

N4843W

N4843W

New member
SE MI
Aircraft Year
1977
Aircraft Type
114
Reg Number
N4843W
Serial Number
14173
Everyone including the AOPA is having a meltdown about the new FAA rule on those with a Body-Mass Index over 40. I just posted elsewhere about my frustration with the FAA on another medical issue, but this one is virtually meaningless. Read this for details and look particularly at the BMI charts:

http://us2.campaign-archive1.com/?u=238772aa3f8efbb034ec01f58&id=96045ab812&e=767b985952


Basically, I would have to weigh another 135 pounds at my height (6'4") to reach a BMI of 40+ !!! I have thought through every COG member I have ever met, and every pilot I know, and I cannot imagine one that would top a BMI of 40. Might be a couple that push 30 and change, but that's it. Simply put, IF your BMI is 40+, you are so morbidly obese that you damn well should get a more thorough work-up because the odds of you not having some serious issues is medically about nil. This is no different than saying someone with signs of cardio-vascular disease, epilepsy or high blood pressure should be evaluated. BFD.

We all love to bitch about the FAA and the so-often deserve it. But not on this one. So everyone, including the AOPA can relax.
 
Re: FAA & BMI: MUCH AD0-doo about nothing

40 may be the number for now, but if the head FAA doctor can simply dictate significant medical policy changes all by himself, what does that mean for the future? They've already said the BMI trigger will probably come down over time. How low?

I think there are two main issues that most people are upset about (in addition to the personal concerns those of us who are overweight might have).

1. Can the FAA (indeed just a department head within the FAA) simply make significant rule changes on a whim?

I think we all know someone (at least one) in a position of authority somewhere that probably shouldn't be there (especially in the government). Do we really want them to be able to make sweeping changes without going through a robust process to make sure it's not a stupid policy change. (I would define stupid as something not necessary that will cost some pilots a lot of money, time, and hassle.)

2. Should the FAA dictate our medical situation even if it has no bearing on being a pilot?

The FAA isn't charged with making sure all Americans are as healthy as can be. (Not even just pilots.) Sure being overweight isn't healthy, but is it a sufficient cause (all by itself, with no other symptoms) to cause pilots to undergo costly additional medical testing? What's next? Your grandfather had a heart-attack so you need to prove that you won't get one? Your ethnic background is more prone to high blood pressure, so you must get semi-annual re-certification? Will the FAA outlaw alcohol use or smoking even outside the cockpit for pilots?

It's already a requirement that any pilot diagnosed with OSA have to jump through hoops to prove it's under control. Then there's the fact that all pilots are supposed to be self-diagnosing whether they're too fatigued to fly anyway. (And that includes fatigued for any reason, not just OSA.)

Should I be concerned about being overweight, just from a personal health perspective? Yes. Should the government regulate everyone's health? NO. (At least not in a free society.) IF there were a history of OSA affecting pilots, then the FAA should certainly pursue the issue (by a logical, regulated process). From what I've read so far, there is no history of OSA being a problem, AND the FAA isn't using any logical process before enacting the new rule.

If we simply let the FAA get away with this stupid rule without a challenge, then how many more will they make in the future? Personally I'm glad it's being challenged. I'd support a challenge to ANY rule (no matter how much sense I thought it made) if it were enacted on a whim without due process.

Holy crap that was a long-winded tirade! Sorry but I've got a hard spot for idiotic policies made by overzealous bureaucrats who think that they're geniuses who know what's good for everyone.
 
Re: FAA & BMI: MUCH AD0-doo about nothing

Mike, I agree 100% on #1. I had not heard it was a one-man change order.

But on #2, anyone who has a BMI of 40+ is in very serious physical shape with major risks to flying. Period. There can be no debate there. That is not "overwieght." That is morbidly obese. And no one is not allowed to fly at 40, they just have to get checked out for that "condition" as it is an indicator of many, many (many) health problems.

And I do not buy the "slippery slope argument" here. Most are specious. If you look over the past 10 years, FAA medical requirements have gotten looser, not tighter on multiple fronts. First and most obvious is the drivers license medical for LSA. Most predicted that would never happen. You can now fly taking depression meds -- not before. You can now fairly easy get approved with Type II diabetes, whereas 10 years ago it was a bitch. I can personally attest that the long process that I went through 11 years ago to get my medical back after a kidney transplant has now been shortened and streamlined considerably. the "slippery slope" argument would have all of those getting tougher, not easier.

But the sad fact is that as a country, we are getting heavier and heavier and it is drastically affecting our health. As one who has lost 30 pounds in the past year with no increase in exercise -- just changing what I eat -- I can attest that it is really not that hard to shed the pounds (for the great majority of us, I know there are exceptions.) So the FAA just woke up to the fact that BMI's over 40 are very dangerous. They are NOT BANNED, but require additional testing to make sure they are fit to fly. I would be shocked if this did not drop to 35, (and still 99% of the pilot population will be under that.)

DUH!
 
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Re: FAA & BMI: MUCH AD0-doo about nothing

The FAA considers me overweight and using their formulas most of the people I saw at the most recent fly in are possibly in the overweight category too. At 5'10" and 190 pounds I would need to lose 20 pounds to be .1 below the overweight category. I haven't weighed 170 since I was in high school.

The proposal is 40 now and will be dropped lower in the years to come. At some point it is going to hit a lot of pilots with a certified test that could cost a few thousand dollars.

This is the way the AME will calculate BMI.

http://www.faa.gov/about/office_org...am/ame/guide/app_process/exam_tech/item21-22/

There are more accurate ways to do it but they are just using height and weight. If someone was say a body builder, that BMI score could get high real fast and it would not be from fat. It just seems like a really broad brush they are using.
 
Re: FAA & BMI: MUCH AD0-doo about nothing

Well said, Mike. Scott, the FAA dept head has already stated that after implementing this, he'll slide the scale down until every airman with OSA is identified.

I was taking a colleague to the airport the other day, and he commented about his CPAP machine, comparing how he got through security compared to another man and his machine I had just met.... Both were as slim as you.
 
Re: FAA & BMI: MUCH AD0-doo about nothing

This one hits close to home for me. Two years ago, I weighed 421 lbs, had high blood pressure, my blood sugar levels were trending upward, and my resting pulse rate was 85-90, even just sitting doing nothing. I was dependent on a CPAP machine to be able to sleep, because I was diagnosed with OSA. I was a morbidly obese mess.

The desire to fly again is what changed my life. I decided to have a gastric bypass, and to work to change my life completely. I've lost 130 lbs, swim a mile every morning, my blood sugar levels are at the low end of normal, blood pressure is normal again, and my resting pulse rate is now 52. And (pertinent to the discussion) I no longer have apnea. Gone without a trace. Have had the sleep studies to prove it. But, according to the BMI formula, I am right at "40", and my neck is 18.5 inches...

So, here comes this FAA dude, declaring his own form of financial torture for me, stating that every two years I will have to shell out $6,500 for a sleep study to prove I don't have a condition that I already know I don't have. Yes, friends, that is what a sleep study can cost you if it is not "medically necessary" and your insurance doesn't pay for it. Ask me how I know...

So is all this uproar "much ado about nothing?" Not for me. After all this effort, I am still right at "40" on the the BMI scale, because they take nothing into account for your build or bone structure in that scale. I played basketball, soccer, and football in high school and college, and weighed 200 lbs (5'11"). At that weight, I was absolutely "cut" - probably <5% body fat. But the BMI tables declare that I was "obese" at that weight. No one who saw me would have agreed with that analysis.

I spent 8 years in the Army, where I had to get waivers every year to stay on flight status because someone in the army used the 1940's era weight tables to declare that if you weighed more that a certain amount, you had to prove your body fat percentage was below a certain threshold. Every year I passed that evaluation with ease, at 210-215 lbs. But again, I was automatically classified as "obese" until I passed the other, more definitive tests. No one who saw me then would have even said I was overweight, much less obese...

So pardon me if I think the BMI scale is complete BS. Why should some yahoo be able to REQUIRE me to arbitrarily weigh less than I did when I was in the military, just because he has a "concern" that an arbitrary measure of height vs weight exceeds an equally arbitrary value, or because my 18.5" neck size exceeds his personal standard? If I weighed the "normal 172 lbs, according to BMI tables, I would probably be dead, or at least seriously anorexic. This is arbitrary, capricious discrimination, pure and simple.

Show me any other medical condition that you must "disprove" through an expensive test, when there is no indication that you have the condition. Worse yet, even after disproving it, you have to continually disprove it time and time again? Ridiculous! Why not mandate that all smokers prove that they DON'T have lung cancer? Or all drinkers prove that they are not alcoholics? Or whatever other crazy ideas come along next?

If the FAA wants to pay for the sleep study every two years, I will withdraw my objections, because it would prove that they really do care about finding and solving problems, rather than just throwing more obstacles in the way of general aviation.

Sleep Apnea is a dangerous condition. People die from it. Reggie White, the legendary pro football hall-of-gamer, died because of sleep apnea. I know what it can do to you. BUT I NO LONGER HAVE THE CONDITION I shouldn't have to prove it every two years.

Today, the "issue" is sleep apnea justifying discrimination against otherwise relatively healthy people who just don't measure up to some arbitrary standard. Who will they decide to persecute next, and on what arbitrary basis?

We need to stop BS this now, or none of us will be flying shortly - which is the likely intent of this bureaucrat!
 
Re: FAA & BMI: MUCH AD0-doo about nothing

I completely agree with you Jim. 100%

This is because of the recent United (Continental) CA who died going from Houston to SEA who died and diverted to BOI. The FAA is taking heat over the age 65 thing. guess what? he was under 60 but weighed around 300 pounds. The FO moved up a seniority number that day but....

The FAA is run by people who sit in zero knot, 1G, 72 degree cubicles. They either know nothing about flying, or were washed out from it and are bitter, or are transferring from some other Govt job and are working for their retirement, but yet they get to set the rules and regs and bars for those of us who just want to fly.

I know AOPA gets bashed once in a while for being too political, but I think they do a good job fighting for those of us who just want to fly and be one of the last countries in the world who really for the most part get to truly enjoy the freedom of flight.

Who knew in 1975 when i was a kid and just wanted to fly that it would involve politicians who want to make a name for themselves over fear and intimidation.

Here is a recent post from the Air Line Pilots Association about this:

November 22, 2013
FAA’s Policy Statement on Sleep Apnea: Update

Yesterday’s FastRead (November 21, 2013) notified the membership that ALPA was aware of the FAA’s new policy on obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) and that we were engaging the FAA and industry on this matter. ALPA has maintained a steady dialogue with FAA and industry stakeholders. As a result of our follow up with the FAA’s leadership, we were informed today that the proposed policy statement on OSA is just that and no more; no decision has been made by the FAA to implement the OSA policy statement. ALPA has requested that the FAA send out a bulletin to their Aviation Medical Examiners (AMEs) as soon as possible to affirm the fact that no policy change has taken place. We continue to collaborate with FAA and other industry stakeholders who share our concerns with the OSA statement.

Despite the FAA’s stance, it has come to ALPA’s attention that some AMEs may be proceeding with new body mass-related sleep apnea screening protocols and may proactively seek to determine whether a pilot suffers from OSA as part of a medical certification exam.

Any ALPA member who is told that they must have a mandatory sleep apnea assessment in accordance with the FAA’s policy statement should report it to ALPA’s Aeromedical Office at 1-866-237-6633.
 
Re: FAA & BMI: MUCH AD0-doo about nothing

Interesting discussion everyone. My only thoughts are that 1) bureaucrats exist to regulate things, and 2) the easing of FAA medical restrictions that Scott mentioned were mostly hard fought wins by the pilot community and not coming from those same bureaucrats.
 
Re: FAA & BMI: MUCH AD0-doo about nothing

At 5'7" if I weighted the recommended 157 lbs I would be to weak to get out the hospital bed........because that is where I would be.
 
Re: FAA & BMI: MUCH AD0-doo about nothing

Never got the thinking between what is "normal" with BMI. In college, I wrestled at 212lbs (6'0" tall) with a measured body fat of 4.6% I had what would be now calculated as a BMI of 28.7. In the overweight category. Go figure.
Being a proud member of the "eighth of a ton club" I qualify for the obese rating now, but the FAA is weigh off base here...
 
Re: FAA & BMI: MUCH AD0-doo about nothing

Good God, guys ... the exception proves the rule. There will always be outliers and I will offer any of you whatever bet you want at 10 to 1 that the BMI will never go below 35. I have had my own battles with the FAA, I hardly think they are sitting around thinking up ways to help us fly. And I have said here many times that anyone who doesn't contribute to AOPA and treasures their right to fly is just plain nuts. But this one is a very small deal and likely to be of no consequence when the smoke clears. Now, 10 years ago when they dropped the threshold for blood sugar from 136 to 124 to define Type II diabetes, that affected 10's of thousands of pilots and you didn't hear squat. And the numbers they use for cholesterol are a total joke. Lowering cholesterol has shown to have a very slight decrease in men only for Cardio Vascular Disease, but a significant increase in overall death rate for both men and women. Insane.

There are plenty of FAA regs and numbers to get justifiably bent about, BMI is not one of them, relatively speaking.


I hear strains of Buffalo Springfield rising in the background.
 
Re: FAA & BMI: MUCH AD0-doo about nothing

The mere hint of a new regulation/policy/rule is cause for concern and Jim nailed it and I too agree with him. What may not apply to you today could in the future.
An out of the blue policy by one person is incredible and it needs to be brought to the attention of our representatives.
 
Re: FAA & BMI: MUCH AD0-doo about nothing

The big issue I see is confounding risk factors and symptoms. If we all had to take medical tests to prove we don't have the conditions indicated by our risk factors, we'd all really be screwed...
 
Re: FAA & BMI: MUCH AD0-doo about nothing

davloose said:
The big issue I see is confounding risk factors and symptoms. If we all had to take medical tests to prove we don't have the conditions indicated by our risk factors, we'd all really be screwed...
Click to expand...

Exactly.
 
Re: FAA & BMI: MUCH AD0-doo about nothing

David, I agree
 
Re: FAA & BMI: MUCH AD0-doo about nothing

obama-brownshirts-tpc-i5134.jpg
 
Re: FAA & BMI: MUCH AD0-doo about nothing

davloose said:
The big issue I see is confounding risk factors and symptoms. If we all had to take medical tests to prove we don't have the conditions indicated by our risk factors, we'd all really be screwed...
Click to expand...

Do you dread seeing a letter from the Medical division or any FAA division for that matter? I got one Friday and required me return my medical. So today put my medical in the mail back to Oklahoma.

Seeing letters from them raises my pulse and BP. I asked for a removal of the diabetes requirement and consider removing the kidney stone requirement of a CT scan each year. No way would that be possible. I am tired of proving a non event.

So tomorrow I will have to call my AME..............I will get a re-issue as this happened last year when I asked for the same considerations.

At what point does one say ...... LSA, oh yeah I have one.
 
Re: FAA & BMI: MUCH AD0-doo about nothing

So I'm with Scott here, I see this as two separate issues-
1) This seems to be a pretty decent-sized rule change based off of (possibly) one or two incidents. To have that not go through the normal rule-making procedures sets a bad precedent.
2) On the rule itself, a BMI of 40 is pretty outrageous. I really don't have a huge issue with the rule as it stands, maybe it could use some tweaking around the sleep study requirements.

Detour warning:
On a somewhat related side note- As (what I'm pretty sure is) the youngest pilot in COG currently, I can tell you some of the tone in this thread is symptom of the overall negative side of aviation culture that (in my opinion) is one of the unmentioned reasons that are stopping more people from becoming pilots.

As a relative newcomer to aviation (discovery flight just over 3 years ago), I'm shocked at adversarial attitude displayed towards the FAA and by extension the rules in general. I mean is it honestly that much of a surprise that most fatal GA accidents are based on terrible ADM and many times blatant rule-breaking when the pilot culture is like this? "Some rule made by some bureaucrat in some cubicle somewhere that knows nothing about flying" "I'm just gonna go up there and take a look"

It's no wonder that the general public (and potential new pilots) see GAs so dangerous when this cavalier anti-establishment, anti-rule culture is pervasive.

The point is this- are there outdated and even silly rules and procedures in the FARs? sure. Unneeded waste and bureaucracy in the FAA? Without a doubt. It's a fact of any large organization- private or government. But I think it does GA a great disservice to jump from "this individual rule/policy is bad and should be changed" to "the FAA is the enemy."

Just my thoughts.
 
Re: FAA & BMI: MUCH AD0-doo about nothing

Tyler

Until you become the focus of some ridiculous action taken by them it might be hard understand why so many are so vocal and concerned. Rule making needs to follow the prescribed process (that's why it's there) . I for one do not want to be subject to individuals in the government overstepping their authority and imposing new regs on us without the data and going through the process.


And I do hope you never get to find out first hand.
 
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