Yousif Alqahtani
Imam Abdulrahman Bin Faisal University, Saudi Arabia
Title: Sinonasal symptoms and outcome in pilots and Flight attendants
Biography
Biography: Yousif Alqahtani
Abstract
Sinonasal symptoms and outcome in pilots and Flight attendants, Chronic rhinosinusitis (CRS) is a common medical condition, resulting in a considerable burden for both patients and health care providers. To determine the SINO-NASAL OUTCOME TEST (SNOT22) score and its effect with flying hours in normal Air crew. This is a cross-sectional based questionnaire was conducted amoung 172 air crews randomly selected in Saudi Arabia. During the period from 24th may 2016 up to 24th august 2016.the survey included: demographic data,smoking,flying hours , effect on the job, (snot22) score and nasal surgery. The research included all Saudi air crews and excluded other air crews nationalities. The data was entered and analyzed by SPSS and chi-squared test. In result, the sample of the study is 172. 142 males(84%) and 27 (16%)females. 45.4% of air crews, their jobs are affected by sinonasal symptoms due to long hours of flying and 24.8% of them canceled their flight due to same problem. Most of the air crews (34.1%) fly more than 12 hours per flight.60% of the air crews complain of block nose and ear pain followed by nasal discharge. By using chi-square test ,there is a statistical significant association between flying hours and nasal discharge (p = 0.012), ear fullness(p = 0.03) and nasal block(p = 0.004).In conclusion, Long flying hours have a significant risk of development many sinonasal problems such as nasal discharge ,nasal block and ear fullness . Therefore ,it is recommended to decrease the flying hours to the air crews.