Introduction

In places such as Japan, driving safety and physical frailty are two urgent issues due to a rapidly aging population. However, few studies have focused on whether physical frailty is associated with traffic crashes among older drivers. This cross-sectional study aimed to investigate the association between frailty phenotype and self-reported traffic crashes in the past year among Japanese community-dwelling older adults.

Methods

The sample consisted of 349 community-dwelling older drivers (aged 74.4 ± 5.0 years) enrolled in the Kasama Health Checkup for Longevity survey in rural Japan. The Japanese version of the Cardiovascular Health Study was used to classify participants into a pre-frail/frail group (n = 155, 44.4%) and a robust group (n = 194, 55.6%). Physical and cognitive function were evaluated using performance-based measures, the Geriatric Depression Scale (GDS) was used to evaluate depressive symptoms, and information on risky driving behaviors and traffic crashes was obtained from a self-report questionnaire.

Results

Compared to robust participants, pre-frail/frail participants demonstrated poorer physical function, scored lower on a total five cognitive functions test (5-Cog), and were more prone to depression. Additionally, pre-frailty/frailty (34.2%) was significantly associated with near-miss traffic incidents, compared to robustness (18.0%). Moreover, 46 participants reported involvement in traffic crashes in the past year (33 of 46 were pre-frail/frail). After adjusting for age, sex, total 5-Cog scores, GDS scores, driving distances, and near-miss traffic incidents, pre-frail/frail participants showed higher rates of traffic crash involvement in the past year than robust participants (OR = 3.74, 95% CI: 1.75–7.96).

Conclusion

Frailty phenotype was shown to be associated with an increased rate of traffic crashes. Our findings can be applied to inform health promotion policies and provide timely interventions designed to improve driving safety among pre-frail/frail older adults.

中文翻译：

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与年长驾驶员交通事故相关的脆弱表型：日本农村的横断面研究

介绍

在日本等地，由于人口迅速老龄化，驾驶安全和身体虚弱是两个紧迫的问题。但是，很少有研究关注身体虚弱是否与年长驾驶员之间的交通事故有关。这项横断面研究旨在调查过去一年在日本居住在社区中的老年人中，脆弱表型与自我报告的交通事故之间的关系。

方法

该样本包括349位居住在日本农村的Kasama长寿健康检查中的社区老司机（年龄为74.4±5.0岁）。日文版《心血管健康研究》将参与者分为虚弱前/虚弱组（n = 155，44.4％）和健壮组（n = 194，55.6％）。身体和认知功能采用基于绩效的评估方法进行评估，老年抑郁量表（GDS）用于评估抑郁症状，并通过自我报告调查表获取有关危险驾驶行为和交通事故的信息。

结果

与健壮的参与者相比，体弱者/体弱者表现出较差的身体机能，在总共五项认知功能测验（5-Cog）中得分较低，并且更容易患抑郁症。此外，与健壮性（18.0％）相比，虚弱前/虚弱（34.2％）与未命中交通事件显着相关。此外，有46名参与者报告说在过去一年中发生了交通事故（46名中的33名是体弱者/体弱者）。在对年龄，性别，5-Cog总分，GDS得分，行车距离和近乎失误的交通事件进行调整之后，体弱者/体弱者在过去的一年中发生交通事故的比率高于健壮者（OR = 3.74 ，95％CI：1.75–7.96）。

结论

脆弱的表型被证明与交通事故率增加有关。我们的发现可用于为健康促进政策提供信息，并提供及时的干预措施，以改善体弱者/体弱者的驾驶安全性。