Tackling the Airport Scanners

As the holiday approached the apprehension about travelling increased. I have never had any problems with flying but suddenly I was faced with having to deal with airport security and a pacemaker. I kept telling myself that it must be simple, many people travel with pacemakers fitted but it didn't make any difference, when travelling day arrived I could feel the tension building.

We were flying from East Midlands Airport, a small airport about an hour from home. We set off in plenty of time and I knew I had my pacemaker card (well A4 sheet of paper printed and folded into a little plastic wallet) in with my passport. This, I was told, would be all I needed.

I don't suppose it helped that we didn't check out journey to the airport before we set off as we had both flown from there many times and believed we knew how to get there. It didn't help that we both thought we came off at Junction 28 and only when we had travelled some 15 minutes along the road with no airport symbols showing on the road signs that we accepted we were on the wrong road and would need to retrace ours steps back to the motorway and carry on. Having lost half an hour of our journey time, we were now going to be close to check in time instead of having time to spare so we could arrive relaxed for the new challenge ahead.

Finally we realised our mistake in thinking we needed the Derby exit when it was actually the Leicester one and we began to see the signs for the airport. We parked up without any problems and arrived the departures section of the airport with a couple of hours to spare. The check-in desks were really quiet and in minutes our case was on its way and we had our boarding cards.

"What do I need to do about going through security with a pacemaker?" I asked. "Just speak to the security officer and they'll tell you what to do," came the answer.

On reaching security we asked the question again and was advised to tell the member of staff where we put our personal possession in the trays to go through the scanner.

I started to fill a tray with my bits and pieces and when the chap came over I showed him my pacemaker card and asked what I needed to do. He called across to one of the security officers and told me to go around the large walk through scanner to the farside and the officer would let me through the perspex gate and frisk search me.

On the other side of the gate I was asked for my card and passport to make sure the name matched on both pieces of identification and happy that they did, they frisked me and told me I could go and collect my personal belongings. 

And it was as simple as that. 

The return journey was no different even with an officer who spoke little English. I showed my pacemaker card, the called an officer over and they took me through the same procedure.

So, travelling is really no more complicated with a pacemaker than travelling before the implant. It's just important to make sure you show your pacemaker card before you reach any body scanner.