The “Boomers” are coming. The good news is that seniors are among the safest drivers on the road and many limit their driving to compensate for age related health and functional changes. The bad news is that seniors are more likely to be seriously injured or killed when involved in a crash. With advancing age come changes in medical health and function that impact on the ability to drive safely. While many seniors accept the need to “hang up the keys”, a minority may continue to drive too long and pose a safety risk to self and others.

Over the next 20 years the number of senior drivers will double and these seniors will likely drive more miles than their predecessors. The majority of these seniors will remain safe drivers, but a growing minority will need attention from state governments and health professionals to know when driving retirement is necessary.

Missouri officials and highway safety professionals from the AAA Foundation For Highway Safety came up with a workable plan, the highlights are:

1. Base final licensing decisions on functional and medical fitness to drive (MFD), not chronological age;

2. Develop and implement empirically defensible criteria and guidelines for functional abilities and MFD;

3. Enact standard reporting laws that provide civil immunity to clinicians and others who report people they think may be medically unfit to drive;

4. Establish and fund active Medical Advisory Boards.

The state of Missouri enacted these requirements into law, as have 44 other states. These laws are far too new to have data as to their effectiveness but I’ll keep you filled-in as they happen.

If you or a loved one are injured or killed in a serious Tennessee automobile accident caused by an elderly driver, or if you want more information about what steps to take if you have a family member who needs an intervention, contact the experience Nashville automobile accident attorneys at Phillip Miller & Associates.

Older Driver Safety Statistics

As an experienced Tennessee automobile accident lawyer I try to keep up with studies and trends in highway safety. On of the major players in highway safety research is the Insurance Institute For Highway Safety.  As the Baby-Boomer generation gets ready to explode onto the scene I thought you would find this study somewhat interesting.

Previous research has found that older driver fatal crash involvement rates per licensed driver declined substantially in the United States during 1997-2006 and declined much faster than the rate for middle-age drivers. The current study examined whether the larger-than-expected decline for older drivers extended to nonfatal crashes and whether the decline in fatal crash risk reflects lower likelihood of crashing or an improvement in survivability of the crashes that occur.

Results: Fatal crash involvement rates declined for older and middle-age drivers during 1997-2008 (1997-2005 for the 13 state subsample), but the decline for drivers 70 and older far exceeded the decline for drivers ages 35-54 (37 versus 23 percent, nationally; 22 versus 1 percent, 13 states). Nonfatal injury crash involvement rates showed similarly larger-than-expected declines for older drivers in the 13 state subsample, but the differences were smaller and not statistically significant (27 percent reduction for older drivers versus 16 percent for middle-age drivers). Property-damage-only crash involvement rates declined for older drivers (10 percent) but increased for middle-age drivers (1 percent). In 1997, older drivers were 3.5 times more likely than middle-age drivers to die in police-reported crashes (6.2 versus 1.8 deaths per 1,000 crashes), but this difference was reduced during the 9-year study period to 2.9 times, as the rate of older drivers dying in a crash declined (5.5 deaths per 1,000 crashes in 2005) and the death risk remained relatively stable for middle-age drivers.

If you or a loved on is injured or killed in a Tennessee motor vehicle accident caused by a negligent driver, contact the experienced Nashville auto accident lawyers at Phillip Miller & Associates for a free consultation.