Association between Road Vehicle Collisions and Recent Medical Contact in Older Drivers: A Case-Crossover Study

The prevalence of medical conditions that may impair driving ability could put older drivers at higher risk of collision. Any contact with a physician could therefore be an opportunity to reach drivers with medical conditions associated with unsafe driving and thus detect drivers at risk of vehicle collisions. This case-crossover study estimates the association between past medical contacts and the risk of vehicle collision in a population of older drivers. A total of 111,699 older drivers involved in at least one vehicle collision between January 1988 and December 2000 were included in the study. For each driver, the risk of having a vehicle collision while exposed and not exposed to a medical contact was compared. Separate conditional logistic regression analyses were conducted for all drivers and in four diagnostic-specific subgroups. Results indicated a weak but statistically significant increased risk of all collisions being associated with a medical contact within 1 month before the collision, for all drivers and for drivers with diabetes. These findings suggest that there might be an opportunity to detect medical conditions that put older drivers at higher risk of collision through their medical contacts. Further research is needed, however, to assess the practicalities and potential effectiveness of screening for medical conditions that contribute to unsafe driving.

• Record URL:
  • https://doi.org/10.1136/ip.2007.016477
• Record URL:
  • http://injuryprevention.bmj.com/cgi/content/full/13/6/382
• Availability:
  • Find a library where document is available. Order URL: http://worldcat.org/issn/13538047
• Authors:
  • Leproust, Sandy
  • Lagarde, Emmanuel
  • Suissa, Samy
  • Salmi, L Rachid
• Publication Date: 2007-12

Language

• English

Media Info

• Media Type: Print
• Features: Figures; References; Tables;
• Pagination: pp 382-387
• Serial:
  • Injury Prevention
  • Volume: 13
  • Issue Number: 6
  • Publisher: BMJ Publishing Group
  • ISSN: 1353-8047
  • EISSN: 1475-5785
  • Serial URL: http://injuryprevention.bmj.com/

Subject/Index Terms

• TRT Terms: Aged drivers; Diabetes; Diseases and medical conditions; Driving; Physicians; Regression analysis; Traffic crash victims; Traffic crashes
• Subject Areas: Data and Information Technology; Highways; Safety and Human Factors; I83: Accidents and the Human Factor;

Filing Info

• Accession Number: 01084551
• Record Type: Publication
• Files: TRIS
• Created Date: Jan 28 2008 8:09AM