Li Guohua, Baker Susan P, Grabowski Jurek G, Qiang Yandong, McCarthy Melissa L, Rebok George W
Department of Emergency Medicine, Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD 21205, USA.
Am J Epidemiol. 2003 May 15;157(10):874-80. doi: 10.1093/aje/kwg071.
Federal aviation regulations prohibit airline pilots from flying beyond the age of 60 years. However, the relation between pilot age and flight safety has not been rigorously assessed using empirical data. From 1987 to 1997, the authors followed a cohort of 3,306 commuter air carrier and air taxi pilots who were aged 45-54 years in 1987. During the follow-up period, the pilots accumulated a total of 12.9 million flight hours and 66 aviation crashes, yielding a rate of 5.1 crashes per million pilot flight hours. Crash risk remained fairly stable as the pilots aged from their late forties to their late fifties. Flight experience, as measured by total flight time at baseline, showed a significant protective effect against the risk of crash involvement. With adjustment for age, pilots who had 5,000-9,999 hours of total flight time at baseline had a 57% lower risk of a crash than their less experienced counterparts (relative risk = 0.43, 95% confidence interval: 0.21, 0.87). The protective effect of flight experience leveled off after total flight time reached 10,000 hours. The lack of an association between pilot age and crash risk may reflect a strong "healthy worker effect" stemming from the rigorous medical standards and periodic physical examinations required for professional pilots.
联邦航空法规禁止航空公司飞行员在60岁以后飞行。然而，飞行员年龄与飞行安全之间的关系尚未通过实证数据进行严格评估。1987年至1997年期间，作者对1987年年龄在45至54岁之间的3306名通勤航空承运人及空中出租车飞行员进行了队列研究。在随访期间，这些飞行员累计飞行时间达1290万小时，发生了66起航空事故，事故发生率为每百万飞行小时5.1起。随着飞行员从四十多岁到五十多岁，坠机风险保持相当稳定。以基线时的总飞行时间衡量的飞行经验，对坠机风险显示出显著的保护作用。在对年龄进行调整后，基线时总飞行时间为5000至9999小时的飞行员发生坠机的风险比经验较少的同行低57%（相对风险 = 0.43，95%置信区间：0.21，0.87）。当总飞行时间达到10000小时后，飞行经验的保护作用趋于平稳。飞行员年龄与坠机风险之间缺乏关联，可能反映出严格的医疗标准和专业飞行员所需的定期体检所产生的强大“健康工人效应”。
