What Is It Like To Be Put Through the Special Issuance Grinder? (Part 2)

By ANN Correspondent Juan Jimenez

• Read Part One

The first sign that were was trouble brewing surfaced when AOPA could not get the FAA to find any trace of the package that the AME had allegedly sent to Oklahoma. Ms. Jeanette Snyder at AOPA, bless her heart, did just about everything possible over a period of weeks to find out what had happened to the paperwork. As it turned out, the AME had not sent it, and had not filed the exam information using the computerized system that all AME's are required to use, so there was nothing to track in the computer either. On top of that, the AME had not obtained all the information required for the FAA to make a decision about the special issuance. One of his nurses assured me that they had "everything we need" but in fact, they did not. They had not even made any attempt to contact my cardiologist and obtain the results of the Thalium stress test that I undertook in August.

Two and a half months were wasted trying to track down information that was never sent in the first place. After attempting to contact the AME and getting no response to my phone messages, I decided to send a FAX, stating in no uncertain terms how upset I was about the whole issue, and suggesting that perhaps the FAA would be able to find the documentation that he never sent.

That seemed to get his attention, because the very next day I received a phone call from his nurse. She told me that he had been told to do nothing that day other than taking care of my medical certificate application. I also talked to the AME, but when he started saying things like how I had dumped this issue on him with no warning - my desire to get my medical back, no less -- I decided there was no point in continuing the conversation. I had in fact contacted his nurse several times in the period between March and August to discuss what I would have to do to get my medical back.

I went to the AME's office and was met by the nurse, who had put together all the medical information she thought was needed, and had me fill out another application for a medical certificate. She then asked me if she should send it by mail, and I refused - I would hand-deliver the paperwork to the Fort Worth office of the FAA.

You would think that after all this I would start to see some light at the end of the tunnel, no? Guess again.

When I delivered the paperwork to the FAA, Ms. Paula Harkins looked it over and gave me a list of all the things that were missing. That's right - on the second try the application was still incomplete! The nurse had not requested any of the records of my hospitalization for the placement of the stent. There was no summary of the resolution of the pancreatitis from my family doctor. There was no letter from my cardiologist stating an overview of my current condition. The original traces and images from the Thalium stress test had not been requested and included.

To put the icing on the cake, she then told me that even if I had had all my paperwork in order, they could not issue a medical. Why? My family doctor had prescribed Wellbutrin to help control my urge to eat in order to compensate for the anxiety of not smoking. However, the AME did not say a word to me that Wellbutrin is an anti-depressant and an instant disqualifier for any medical certificate. Now, you tell me - how does an AME with twenty-five years of alleged experience miss a prescription medicine clearly disclosed in an application, which instantly disqualifies a pilot from holding a medical certificate?

I had to obtain a letter from my family doctor that I was off Wellbutrin, and then get to work getting all the paperwork together that the AME should have either obtained himself or asked me to get prior to sending the paperwork to the FAA. It took the records office at the local hospital over two hours to print out all their records on my hospitalization. It took me about half an hour to convince the cardiologist's records clerk that I was going to take the original tracings and images of my Thalium stress test, and no, copies would not do. Then there were the letters of evaluation of current condition and the resolution of previous illnesses.

All of this paperwork I dutifully hand delivered to the FAA's building in Fort Worth over a period of weeks as I worked through the appointments required to obtain them. Of course, I had to go through searches of my vehicle and my person in order to do this, but I did not mind, because I thought that this was the way to ensure that nothing else would happen to my package. Right?

Wrong.

Five weeks after the last piece of paperwork requested by the FAA was hand-delivered, I was trying to find the status of the application. At first I was given the standard "Call us back in six to eight weeks." I felt like I was applying for a rebate… but I counted to ten, waited, called again a couple of weeks later… and was told there was no record of the package making its way to Oklahoma! The only plausible explanation I was given was that the mail was taking a long time going through screening for things like anthrax, which did not make sense to me. Why would the FAA purposefully delay the transfer of the paperwork by using the US Postal Service instead of internal mail or one of the couriers?

I then asked Ms. Snyder at AOPA -- who had already bent over backwards three different ways trying to help me - to see if she could get an answer. To my surprise, she responded that the FAA has now changed procedures so that AOPA can no longer call the FAA to get a status. They now have to collect names and FAX them over to the FAA, to be checked when someone has the time to get to it. It took more than a week. I suppose this is one of the new procedures the new FAA administrator has put in place to streamline the agency. Still no answer.

A few days later I once again tried to track down my special issuance status, so I called the FAA, and the lady told me the same thing, that the computer showed that the region was still handling it. I decided to call the region to see what was going on. Surely the paperwork had been sent to Oklahoma in the first place, right?

That's when I blew my top.

The package was still there, in Fort Worth, sitting on the FAA employee's desk. The employee was on leave until the next week. The package was sitting there with a note that I had allegedly been notified that the Thalium stress test images of my heart were still missing - the same images I had hand-delivered to them, along with my EKG's. I did not even go home that day, I went to the FAA straight from the doctor's office. I was scared to death something would happen to the originals, Murphy would strike again, or who knows what.

I felt like choking something, anything. I could feel my blood boiling. It took all the strength I had not to switch to Spanish and communicate some choice phrases in my native language to the person on the other end of the phone. No wonder nobody could find anything… nothing had been sent!!! Again!!!

• Read Part Three

FMI: www.faa.gov