TY - CHAP M1 - Book, Section TI - Aerospace Medicine A1 - Johnson, Robert A1 - Armstrong, Christopher R. A1 - Orford, Robert R. A2 - Boulton, Matthew L. A2 - Wallace, Robert B. Y1 - 2022 N1 - T2 - Maxcy-Rosenau-Last Public Health & Preventive Medicine, 16e AB - Aerospace medicine is a preventive medicine specialty focusing on the health of crewmembers and passengers of air and space vehicles, and the people who support the operation of such vehicles. In contrast to most physicians who evaluate and care for persons with abnormal physiology (illness) in normal (terrestrial) environments, aerospace medicine specialists evaluate and assist healthy individuals and individuals with abnormal physiology to function optimally in abnormal (nonterrestrial), remote, isolated, extreme, or enclosed environments under conditions of physical and psychological stress. While aerospace medicine began with the balloon flights of the Montgolfier brothers in the late 1700s and the experiments of Paul Bert a century later, the field grew quickly after the demonstration of controlled powered flight by the Dayton, Ohio-based Wright brothers at Kittyhawk, North Carolina, in 1903. Thousands of civilian and military aircraft were built and flown before and during World War I, with rapid technological advances. Commercial aviation began in the 1920s, initially in unpressurized aircraft flying short distances at low altitudes. Pressurized aircraft in the 1930s allowed higher, further, and faster flights. During World War II, the need for air superiority dictated the development of breathing systems and pressure suits to allow pilots to fly even higher and faster, and with greater maneuverability.1 SN - PB - McGraw Hill CY - New York, NY Y2 - 2024/03/29 UR - accessmedicine.mhmedical.com/content.aspx?aid=1182682066 ER -