Sick passenger 'humiliated' by airline
Monday, 29 August 2011

GoTravel24:

Air travel can be a harrowing experience for some - most of the time. Add to that a medical condition and the stress levels undoubtedly double.

So image the ordeal of a diabetic woman who claims she suffered a humiliating experiences recently when travelling from Cape Town to Joburg, thanks to what she believes to be "ignorance of her medical condition on the part of airlines and the Airports Company SA (Acsa)".

According to reports, Gail Sampson says she was humiliated in front of other passengers at both the Cape Town and OR Tambo International Airports by Mango Airlines and ACSA staff before boarding her flights.

Sampson claims when she checked in at Cape Town International's Mango check-in point she informed the lady she was a diabetic travelling with insulin but was apparently not allowed to board as the insulin needle was classified as a dangerous weapon. Despite having a doctor's letter to confirm she was diabetic and a list of other equipment and medication related to the disease, Sampson was told "it did not matter".

After some obvious ranting and clearance from a supervisor, she was eventually allowed to board. But that was not the end of it. Sampson experienced the same problem a few days later, this time the alleged humiliation was thanks to Acsa staff at OR Tambo Airport, who questioned her in a "rude" manner regarding her diabetic medical equipment.

According to Acsa hand luggage guidelines' on dangerous or hazardous items, syringes and hypodermic needles for medical use should be declared to the airline check-in agent or checkpoint security staff. If labelled correctly and accompanied by the proper medicines such as insulin and clearance certificates, the passenger should be allowed to board.

In this instance there seems to be no reason why the passenger should have been refused to board.

According to a new study on Health24's Travel Health changes in cabin pressure during flights may cause insulin pumps to deliver too much or too little of the medication - possibly putting sensitive diabetics at risk.

Sufferers are advised to disconnect the pump before take-off and after landing and making sure there are no air bubbles in the insulin before reconnecting it.

After learning of a 10-year-old girl with type-1 diabetes whose blood sugar got too low an hour after take-off, Bruce King of John Hunter Children's Hospital in Newcastle, Australia, and colleagues found cases of other insulin-pump-using diabetics who reported the same problem during flight. To see what was going on, they put ten insulin pumps on a commercial flight.

Sure enough, during takeoff (when air pressure was decreasing), the pumps delivered about 1 to 1.4 extra units of insulin, on average. (For comparison, a typical adult with type-1 diabetes might need about 50 units of insulin per day.)

Dr Cohen added that it's important patients know how to carry out these recommendations safely, if they're going to follow them. Otherwise, he said, "their solution may be worse than the underlying problem if somebody doesn't really understand how to carry it out."

It's possible other big changes in pressure could cause insulin pumps to deliver too much or too little of the drug - such as ski lifts, or even a trip up the Empire State Building for very young kids, King said.

Source: gotravel24.com