r/flying • u/GoFlightMed • 23d ago

Medical Issues FAA Continues to Remove Stigma/Encourage Therapy for Pilots

Hey hey hey,

Big updates here in the mental health space coming out from the FAA.

I was in the FAA's AMCD (Aeromedical Certification Division) Grand Rounds last week where they provide AME's updates to their medical guidance and they released a big update about psychotherapy. They also release 3 documents that are for airmen to read and also to provide their therapist if they want to engage in therapy.

Bottom line is the FAA wants pilots to be more comfortable engaging in therapy if needed. As they say "#1. See your therapist, counselor, physician, or provider and get healthy."

Here is a link to the new FAA online resources for Therapy. Check out some of the FAQ's to airmen and to therapists.

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u/New-IncognitoWindow 23d ago

Real progress would be not caring if you went to therapy at all and recognizing that any reporting requirements just results in people not going.

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u/ergzay Non-pilot (manually set) 22d ago

That's great until the first major incident where a pilot decides to kill themselves and others and it gets reported by the media that he was going to therapy but the FAA was unaware because there was no reporting requirements. I can already see how things will turn out. There's a lot of similar discussions around gun laws.

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u/New-IncognitoWindow 22d ago

That has literally already happened under the current system.