Well it is like so much else.
All the time you are unaware that your engine is full of rust, it is 100% airworthy and you are legal to fly. But when somebody looks inside and becomes aware, it is not airworthy anymore.
So your arteries could be well bunged up but provided you get the medical, you are legal to fly 
Any intervention should be disclosed; in Part-MED there are no concessions whatsoever. And most AMEs will throw you to the lions because they are agents of the CAA.
But whatever needs doing, you should get it done regardless of flying – for your own health. Most pilots caught up in this instead pack in flying…
Peter wrote:
But as a cardiologist you will know that nearly everything in the heart can be fixed.
Surprisingly much so. A friend of mine (in his 60-s) had a heart condition which required several operations and he had to carry a pacemaker for a while. Still in the end he got back an unrestricted class 1 medical.
Usually a Class 2 (or FAA Class 3; the FAA Class 2 is for ATC) is achievable OK. A Class 1 tends to have a dual pilot restriction, but jet CAT ops have 2 pilots anyway. Single pilot stuff like the Islander run to Scilly Isles etc would not be possible.
FAA Class 2 is for ATC
I don’t think so (unless we’re not talking about the same thing). You need a Class 2 issued within the last year to “exercise commercial privileges”, i.e. to get paid for flying (if only!). After a year it becomes functionally a Class 3, good for PPL activity for 2 years or 5, depending on age. Class 1 is only needed to exercise ATP privileges.
There’s very little difference between Classes 2 and 3 (one small thing iirc). When I got my first Class 2 I asked the AME what it would take to get a Class 2 AFTER he did the Class 3 exam, and he said “Oh, I just tick this box instead of this one”. And did so.
I’ve stopped getting FAA Class 3s for now at least. For flying in the US, If you can get a medical doctor to sign you off then BasicMed is good for four years. Also, and importantly, you can have any discussion you want with the issuing doctor. If he doesn’t like what he hears (for any reason) there is no record of the conversation or application, worst case you just leave and go to any other doctor and do it again. With a medical record having any wrinkles whatsoever that provides a lot of value, even if BasicMed is likely to take more time. Class 3s are great when they take 15 minutes with the AME based on an application that documents almost no medical history (that was my experience over 20 years since resuming flying) but I don’t want to have to establish a relationship with an AME, have him do medical tests himself or discuss my medical history with anybody having FAA authority if I have a better option.
I have BTW had two ECGs in my life, neither having anything to do with flying – the FAA Class 2 or 3 does not require any such thing at any stage (see below). The first one showed an anomaly, the second follow-up exercise ECG was with a cardiologist who reported no issues. My real MD knows about this and I’m planning to explore it further, but not with FAA tagging along for the ride. I’d rather use a very disciplined approach in that regard.
If I had seen this post before I would have posted my question here About The FAA widening the EKG standards applied for their Pilot license holders. Yes that includes Class 2 and 3.
As I had explained in my response to one of the members why it also pertains to not just the first class medical. However I did not find the thread in which I had given the answer. So unless it was moved to another location I can only assume it was deleted.
So my question was, does the European equivalent to the FAA Medical Standards office also widened the parameters? If they did upon what data basis did they do that?
Its a simple question and should be non threatening.
I have had 43 yrs worth of Airmans Flight physicals performed Class 2 and 3 at least 28 examinations and during that peiod of time, I have noticed that the questions have become more intrusive concerning your health history and the enforcement actions more draconian taken by the FAA. There is a ton of information on the subject at the AOPA member medical section.
I know of someone with a 3rd class medical who answered the Questions on his medical form correctly and had to submit his private Drs EKG results. It fell outside the parameters at the time. I think about 10+ years ago. Had his medical yanked then spent $1000s to get it back to no avail. He had to sell his plane and last time I heard he is still alive. Kinda unfair.
Some guy on this site stated something erroneously about a source I used in the thread and I rebutted his statement with multiple links correcting his false statement. But it is gone. “We chose Truth over Facts” mentality at work.
Now Im curious to see if this post is also going to be deleted as well.
Oh by the way I will on Monday call up the US AOPA and try and get an answer to my question and report back with what they tell me.
In a recent US AOPA mag there is an article about the Class 3 and that if you had an ECG/EKG done for whatever purpose, the AME is required to send it to the FAA, with details of why you had it done.
The FAA got itself into a bit of trouble, because they stated that a lot of their pilot medical requirements are not based on any data. IOW they continue them because they always have… but nobody can do anything.
Same in Europe; as posted further back, a European AME is an agent of the CAA (not you) and is required to disclose everything you tell him. No change there since for ever. But nobody running part-Med is going to be dumb enough to make the FAA admission
The difference is that the US has a functioning AOPA, whereas there is no AOPA in Europe which does anything beyond little local-interest bits, once every 10 years…
Yes, other thread has been deleted because it was another anti vacc topic. EuroGA is not a place for these, not just because it will be many years before correlations, let alone causal factors, of covid vaccinations become apparent. And it will be very hard to see any correlations because nearly everybody got vacced. Please take that to FB etc; it is full of this. I’ve already had a good friend of 30 years on there saying how sorry he is for me, because both Justine and I will soon die. One woman we know was going to set up a home for cats, because millions of cat owners will soon die.
In a recent US AOPA mag there is an article about the Class 3 and that if you had an ECG/EKG done for whatever purpose, the AME is required to send it to the FAA, with details of why you had it done.
I would assume this is required if and when the AME himself does the test, or orders it done, as a result of the FAA application form documenting a history of “heart or vascular trouble”. Otherwise there is no reason why the subject of an ECG/EKG would come up during an examination for a FAA Class 2 or 3 medical.
C210_Flyer wrote:
So my question was, does the European equivalent to the FAA Medical Standards office also widened the parameters? If they did upon what data basis did they do that?
Its a simple question and should be non threatening.
From what I read on the FAA website, the definition of what the FAA consider normal variants has been updated, and specifically for the PR interval – a measure of conduction velocity in the heart – this has been amended to allow a wider interval (up to 300 ms from 200 ms before) IF THERE ARE NO AME CONCERNS. EASA will not follow this because they don’t need to – they have had the same condition (1st degree AV block ie stable PR interval longer than 200 ms) as a non-issue for years and don’t even specify an upper limit. The stuff you read about this on social media etc is mind-blowingly dumb at times.
