Differences between professional and non-professional drivers with cognitive disorders

The study describes the driving habits of people with cognitive disorders and previous professional driving experience. A similar study has not been mentioned in the literature.

From a total of 639 drivers who participated in the research, 153 participants were selected based on their answer on an extensive driving questionnaire. They were asked whether they had a professional driving license. Forty-three participants (28.1%) said "Yes", 110 participants (71.9%) said "No". Out of the 153 participants, 55 (35.9%) were diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease (AD), 44 (28.8%) with Mild Cognitive Impairment (MCI), and 54 (35.3%) were healthy. Additionally, 31 professional drivers were compared to 31 non-professional drivers (N=62) on a short driving questionnaire. The distribution of the population according to the diagnosis was: 18 (29%) with MCI (N=9 professionals, N=9 non-professionals), 30 (48.4%) with AD (N=15 professionals, N=15 non-professionals), 14 (22.6%) healthy (N=7 professionals, N=7 non-professionals). Professional and non-professional drivers were randomly selected to match in terms of diagnosis, age, gender and years of education. The AD diagnosis was based on the NINCDS-ARDRA criteria while the MCI diagnosis was based on the Petersen and Winblad criteria. Healthy older adults were examined across the same neuropsychological battery.

The extensive driving questionnaire showed that more non-professional AD drivers (21.9%) had not renewed their license compared to professionals (p=0.048). More non-professional MCI drivers (91.7%) travelled fewer kilometers compared to professionals (p=0.029). Taking both MCI (27.6%) and AD patients (63.2%) together, more non-professional drivers always avoided driving in unfamiliar areas compared to professionals, MCI (p=0.045) and AD (p=0.026). Finally, more non-professional AD drivers (80.0%) avoided driving when it snowed compared to professionals (p=0.34). The short driving questionnaire showed that healthy non-professional drivers almost always (85.7%) avoided turning into difficult intersections compared to professional drivers (14.3%) (p=0.001).

People with cognitive disorders and previous professional experience were better at driving than the inexperienced ones.