Reporting by physicians of impaired drivers and potentially impaired drivers

Alcohol Consumption, Smoking, Job Stress and Road Safety in Professional Drivers

“…The adjustment and quality of the cluster model allow to support the clear difference in terms of these variables between professional drivers who have (or not) the habit of regularly drinking alcohol, in accordance to which has been suggested in several studies assessing the increased risk of misbehaviors and/or accidents at the wheel based on this behavior [1][2][3][4][5][6][7]43,77]. Furthermore, obtained differences in terms of Job Strain between drivers in both clusters (i.e., higher Job Strain rates for participants in cluster number 1) result consistent to other empirical research documenting the critical relationships existing between: a) job stress and both addressed addictive behaviors [34, 78,79], b) job stress and traffic accidents [49,80,81], and c) addictive behaviors such as alcohol consumption, lifestyle factors and safety outcomes [81,82]. It also suggests the need for the development of comprehensive interventions on psychosocial factors at work, keeping in mind the recent growing evidence on the impact of working conditions and its related processes, such as fatigue [83], burnout [52] and social support [84], contributing to the emergence of new risks for health [85], and welfare of professional drivers [86].…”

“…In the same way than adverse physical [48,49] and mental [50] health conditions, fatigue [8,10], smoking and alcohol consumption [51], job stress, closely linked to typically adverse working conditions, has been systematically associated to poor safety outcomes in the field of public transportation [52,53]. However, several studies dealing with alcohol consumption and job stress have suggested the need of further to clarify the causal nature of the association between stressors at work and addictive habits related to alcohol and other substances [54].…”

Performance in normal subjects on a novel battery of driving-related sensory-motor and cognitive tests

“…The three visuoperceptual tests were Visual Resolution, which measured the minimum separation at which a subject was able to identify a dot as being off the center of a vertical line; Static Perception, which measured the minimum separation at which a subject was able to identify the tip of an arrow as being off a vertical line or a sinusoidal waveform; and ing judgments regarding their patients' medical fitness to drive. Whereas most countries allow for voluntary reporting, medical practitioners in some U.S. states are required by law to report drivers who have medical or functional impairments affecting safe driving ability to the appropriate licensing agency (Berger, Rosner, Kark, & Bennett, 2000;Wang, Kosinski, Schwartzberg, & Shanklin, 2003), as are those in some Canadian provinces (Berger et al, 2000) and Australian states (Austroads, 2006), as well as in New Zealand (Land Transport Safety Authority, 2002). When there is doubt regarding an individual's fitness to drive, practitioners in most countries refer the patient to a specialist driving assessment service.…”

Confidentiality and fitness to drive: Professional, ethical, and legal duties in the case of the diabetic bus driver

“…Similarly, outside the ambit of this article, there is the broader question of whether reporting of risky drivers ought to be legally mandatory under South African (SA) law, as in some other nations and states. [5,6] …”