Can patients with cranial defects fly?

Life is constantly faced with a variety of accidents and injuries, such as various traffic accidents, production safety accidents, falling objects, as well as various craniocerebral disorders, etc., all of which may cause cranial defects. Cranial defects can cause a series of harm to health, damage to the appearance of the image, the patient’s psychological pressure will also be very high, even the usual travel will be restricted. Patients with cranial defects ask if they can fly if they want to go to farther places in the country or travel abroad. From the perspective of neurosurgical specialty, it is not recommended to fly for patients with cranial defects. The cranial defect lacks the protection of the skull, and the surface of the cerebral cortex is directly connected to the skin, so the pressure of the outside air and atmosphere acts on the surface of the brain directly through the skin. During the takeoff and landing of the airplane, the change of air pressure in the cabin will cause some pressure on the brain surface through the skin directly in the area of the skull defect. If the pressure change is particularly large, it may produce more serious damage to the cerebral cortex, especially if the airplane produces an emergency situation, the airplane air cabin pressure change is more violent, may induce seizures. Therefore, air travel is generally not recommended for patients with cranial defects. Therefore, it is recommended that patients with cranial defects should not travel by airplane until after they have undergone repair surgery, so as to avoid accidents on airplanes. Now the technology of cranial bone repair has been quite mature, the current medical recommendation to use peek material to repair the skull. peek material is a new type of special polymer material with excellent performance, he is very good to overcome the titanium mesh material may produce a variety of problems, the application of cranial bone repair can be achieved with excellent repair results. peek material properties are very close to the human autologous skull, in terms of hardness, stiffness, and the ability to repair the skull. The properties of peek material are very close to those of human autologous cranium, and it is excellent in hardness, elasticity, heat insulation, histocompatibility, and plasticity, etc. Meanwhile, it can also be personalized three-dimensional shaping according to the shape and structure of the patient’s head, highly restoring the appearance of the head.