Main factors causing health-related vehicle collisions and incidents in Japanese taxi drivers

OBJECTIVES: To find the main factors causing drivers' health-related vehicle collisions and to aid the search for preventive measures, we performed a cross-sectional survey of all taxi drivers in Tochigi Prefecture, Japan. Methods: The analysis used 844 returned self-administered questionnaires on drivers' working conditions and health status that had been sent to all 2156 company-employed taxi drivers in February 2013. Results: Mean driver age was 60.7 (SD 8.1) years old with a mean work experience of 16.9 (SD 12.3) years. Of all participants, 69.9% had been diagnosed with a chronic disease: hypertension (38.2%), hyperlipidemia (21.8%), diabetes mellitus (16.8%), heart disease (5.9%), and gastrointestinal ulcer (3.9%). A total of 98 drivers experienced a collision or near miss incident due to their own acute health problems. The prevalence of drivers who regularly refer to the physician was significantly lower and the frequency of day and night working per month was significantly higher in drivers with a health-related collision or incident than in drivers without such event (73.7% vs. 85.6%, p=0.015; 7.5 vs. 6.1, p=0.041). Conclusions: The results suggest the need for appropriate disease control of taxi drivers and for some organizational and policy measures, e.g., reduction of work hours and work stress. Development of pre-crash safety systems that collect video of driver incidents or collisions because of health problems might be required in future. Keywords: traffic accident, vehicle collision, commercial driver, disease, prevention. Language: en

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