Clinicians increasingly are being faced with the difficult task of assessing driving capacity and providing driving rehabilitation services for patients who have suffered brain injuries. This paper reviews practical clinical issues and provides suggestions for effective clinical approaches. Driving assessment and rehabilitation issues can be categorised into: legal and ethical implications; risk assessment and risk management strategies; treatment planning and intervention issues; medication concerns; and family issues. There are few clear guidelines for rehabilitation of the driver, and clinicians often do not have access to driving tests, simulators, adaptive driving programs or specialised personnel such as neuropsychologists. To help in their assessment and rehabilitation, therefore, clinicians should familiarise themselves with the current state of the art technology and research, and integrate whatever tools or professional strategies are available to them into a multistage decision model that makes use of a co-ordinated team effort.
Abstract