Contributions of Hypoxia-Awareness Training to the Familiarization of Personal Symptoms for Occupational Safety in the Flight Environment.

Kwo-Tsao Chiang,Chung-Yu Lai,Yun-Yi Wang,Chao-Chien Cheng,Hsin-Hui Chen,Min-Yu Tu,Wun-Wei Huang,Yu-Lung Chiu

doi:10.3390/ijerph18062904

Abstract

Hypoxia remains a flight-safety issue in terms of aviation medicine. Hypoxia-awareness training has been used to help aircrew members recognize personal hypoxia symptoms. There is still no study, as yet, to establish the association of within-subject data between inflight hypoxia events and the altitude chamber. The main purpose of our study was to use paired subjects’ data on inflight hypoxia symptoms compared with those experienced during training. A questionnaire was developed to obtain information on military aircrew members in 2018. Among 341 subjects, 46 (13.49%) suffered from inflight hypoxia. The majority of the subjects detected ongoing inflight hypoxia on the basis of their previous experience with personal hypoxia symptoms or sensations in previous chamber flights. Of the top five hypoxia symptoms, the data revealed that hot flashes, poor concentration, and impaired cognitive function appeared both during the inflight events and during the hypoxia-awareness training. The occurrence rate of hypoxia symptoms was found to not be significantly different between the in-flight events and the past chamber flights through an analysis of within-subject data. Because the individual memory had faded away over time, fresher hypoxia awareness training is still mandatory and valuable to recall personal hypoxia experience for military aircrew members.

Highlights

IntroductionBased on Dolton’s law, atmospheric pressure at sea level is 760 mmHg, but it decreases with increasing altitude
Introduction distributed under the terms andBased on Dolton’s law, atmospheric pressure at sea level is 760 mmHg, but it decreases with increasing altitude
We found that there was no significant difference in the frequency of the in-flight hypoxia symptoms when compared to those during the chamber flights

Summary

Introduction

Based on Dolton’s law, atmospheric pressure at sea level is 760 mmHg, but it decreases with increasing altitude. Oxygen partial pressure decreases and leads to fewer oxygen molecules being inhaled and less air exchanged by human lungs. In this situation, there is insufficient oxygen being delivered to vital organs, impairing those functions, conditions of the Creative Commons.

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