The Federal Aviation Administration is working to enhance the accessibility of mental health care by encouraging open communication and prioritizing the welfare of those who ensure passenger safety in the air.

For a pilot, the sky is the limit, but as most know, the profession can come with a bit of turbulence.

“As a pilot, not only are you making sound, good judgment in the air, but you're also doing it before flight, and here on the ground,” said Ajay Raghavendra, a member and flight instructor at Condair Flyers Flying Club.

He has been a pilot and flight instructor for over a decade, and knows how essential it is for pilots to be in their best form. And that includes their mental health.

“I have seen cases where students have had a great flight. Student pilots are doing very well, but then they have a bad day or a series of bad days, and now you have to ask, 'Well, you were doing so well. What went wrong?' And that's definitely a conversation to have,” Raghavendra said.

According to the FAA, pilots are encouraged to seek help if they have a mental health condition, but many don’t for fear they will be disqualified from the job, said aviation neuro-psychologist Dr. Chuck Denison.

“The federal code of regulations has very specific requirements for the kind of mental health that a pilot has to have established in order to get a medical certificate," Denison said. "And there are a number of disqualifications. Some of them are pretty obvious. Like, if a person were to have schizophrenia, or a psychotic disorder, that would be a very dangerous condition to have and to try to fly an airplane.”

Pilots are required to report certain mental health conditions to their aviation medical examiners, which are trained to determine a pilot’s fitness to fly. And the FAA says less than one percent of applicants that disclose issues are denied.

Denison said the process can get complicated.

"Pilots are getting passed between different offices and evaluators," he said. "And that's, that inherently is going to be more difficult when you have more people working at the same case as opposed to one person.”

That’s why the FAA is creating a Pilot Mental Health Aviation Rulemaking Committee, which will aim to make it easier for pilots to get mental health care. It's an initiative that was at the forefront of a recent aviation safety summit.

“The safety risk comes from a culture of silence around mental health," said Jennifer Homendy, chairwoman of the National Transportation Safety Board. "A culture that empowers people to get the care they deserve to be healthy in mind and in body… that will strengthen safety.”

As flight instructors oversee their students, Raghavendra said it’s important to be in tune with their performance.

“We do undergo a little bit of training to understand human behavior that is part of our training to become a flight instructor, and employing some of that training and some of that education on your students and on your passengers helped a lot,” Raghavendra said.