Clearing a Road to Driving Fitness by Better Assessing Driving Wellness: Development of California's Prospective Three-Tier Driving-Centered Assessment System: Summary Report

This report presents a summary of the final development and validation of an integrated three-tier system for assessing drivers’ degree of driving wellness and driving fitness. The first two tiers assess the driver’s degree of driving wellness and the third tier assesses driving fitness. The report defines driving wellness as the degree of freedom from driving-relevant functional limitations and driving fitness as the degree to which a driver compensates for any such limitations while actually driving. Both driving wellness and driving fitness are assessed in a driving-centered manner. The report describes assessment tools recommended for use in each tier, as well as the selection of two decision points (cutpoints) which separate drivers into three categories: pass ("driving-well"), "somewhat functionally limited", and "extremely functionally limited." The report describes the flow of renewal license applicants through the three-tier assessment system and offers recommendations. In particular, it recommends that the three-tier assessment system be adopted on a pilot basis for further evaluation.