A first gross impairment screening of the general physical and mental abilities of the elderly drivers : projects and approaches in Switzerland.

With the growth of the elderly population in modern industrial countries, the number of elderly drivers has been rising dramatically. To take an example, in 1999 in the Canton of Vaud, 25,000 individuals were aged 70 years or older, but by 2010, the number will have increased to between 70,000 and 100,000. The authors were asked by the Traffic Administration of the Canton of Vaud to create a simple and cost effective screening instrument. In this contribution, the elderly driver and the necessity to provide an organised approach to observing and describing important aspects of an individual's mental functioning based on the requirements of security and prevention of accidents in a situation of modern traffic are discussed. The Mental Status Examination (MSE) ranges from a cursory 5-minute survey of cognitive functioning to a detailed evaluation that is administered by a psychologist and requires several hours. As the amount of detail required depends on the purpose for which the information is to be used, a specific general physical and mental abilities examination in traffic psychology has to contain items measuring the ability of the elderly driver to conform to modern traffic and its requirements. A specific examination has to answer to all these aspects. The authors describe the importance to develop a simple but powerful instrument for a preliminary test to avoid overly complicated and expensive measures that should only be taken after a negative preliminary diagnostic and propose an instrument for the preliminary screening of the elderly driver. They describe the special psychological requirements of traffic instructors and traffic psychologists working with the elderly driver. The authors feel that the GRIMPS (Gross Impairment Screening Battery of General Physical and Mental Abilities) of the NHTSA research project represents the best initial assessment of cognitive and mobility impairment adapted to the specific context of security requirements and accident prevention in modern traffic. The GRIMPS Screening Battery is briefly recapitulated. For the covering abstract see ITRD E113725 (C 22328 CD-ROM).