Airline crew responses to rare pre-term labor and childbirth during flight have been difficult for the industry to assess quantitatively compared with much more frequent types of in-flight medical events (IFMEs).1,2 Either situation may occur because a pregnant passenger fails to comply with an airline’s policy for travel or, more likely, because an unknown health factor or natural process disrupts her careful plans for the ideal full-term childbirth. In an aircraft cabin, both are serious, exposing the baby to high risk of injury, death or possibly health problems later in life even with timely emergency medical transport after landing to a neonatal intensive care unit.
Medical and cabin safety specialists — relatively comfortable with airline guidelines and readiness to deal with leading IFMEs such as heart attacks — today have sketchier information when it comes to pre-term labor and childbirth aboard a large commercial jet. As a result, researchers in several co…
