The following three causes of sleepiness are the focus of the study presented in this scientific poster: (1) not getting enough sleep on a routine basis; (2) getting much less sleep than needed on a short-term or single night basis; and (3) not sleeping when one's biological clock is programmed to sleep. Population-based samples of drivers in recent crashes were identified from North Carolina (NC) crash report forms as they were received at the Division of Motor Vehicles office in Raleigh, NC. All cases in which the driver of a vehicle was coded as either "asleep" or "fatigued" by the investigating officer were identified, along with a random sample of control (non-sleep, non-fatigue) crash drivers. The identified drivers were then contacted for telephone interviews to obtain information on their work/sleep schedules and circumstances surrounding their crashes. Interviews were completed with 312 drivers in sleep crashes, 155 drivers in fatigue crashes, and 529 drivers in control crashes. Drivers were identified as experiencing chronic sleep loss, acute sleep loss, or night-time sleep disruption. The results show, among other things, that these three factors were all found to be important contributors to sleep-related motor vehicle crashes. A conclusion is that the vast majority of such crashes involve individuals who either do not get enough sleep on a regular basis, got far too little sleep the night before their crash, and/or were trying to drive when their biological clocks were programmed for sleep.
Abstract