Karnataka - Bangalore   

Aerospace medicine, a sought-after course

Staff Reporter

Bangalore-based institute offers 55 courses

BANGALORE: Although Aerospace Medicine does not form a part of normal curriculum during undergraduate medical education, the Bangalore-based Institute of Aerospace Medicine offers 55 courses to cater to 425 medical officers of the three armed services, civilian doctors, military aircrew, civil aircrew and paramedical personnel.

Training is also offered to personnel from friendly foreign countries.

All IAF medical officers undergo a 12-week Primary Course in Aerospace Medicine.

According to the institute officials, the three-year residency course in Aerospace Medicine is a much sought after specialty among both the armed forces medical officers as well as civil doctors.

Among the courses offered is the Advanced Fighter Aircrew Indoctrination Course (AFAIC), also known as the High G course, which equips aircrew with the knowledge and means to successfully handle G stress. A three-day Night Vision Goggles (NVG) indoctrination course for helicopter aircrew is conducted at the indigenously developed NVG training laboratory.

The Basic Spatial Disorientation (SD) indoctrination course was started in 2005 for both fast jet fighter and helicopter aircrew. This training in full motion-based SD simulator has given a quantum leap to realistic SD training for aircrew, according to the IAM.

Aerospace Medicine is a multi-disciplinary science, which integrates, applies and extends fundamentals of clinical, basic medical and allied sciences to the biological problems of flight. The specialty of Aerospace Medicine is multi-dimensional and incorporates the tenets from several subjects into the matrix of evolved medical knowledge.

An aerospace medicine specialist constitutes an important link in the chain of flight safety, by ensuring that aircrew and all aviation support personnel are in their optimum state of body and mind to undertake aviation missions.

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