Assessing  Senior Driving Safety

Some of the best drivers we've known have been on the road for 50-plus years. And some of the scariest drivers have been driving for the same length of time. Like drivers of every age, there are good and not-so-good older drivers.

Eventually, though, if a person lives long enough, physical abilities and mental acuity generally tend to decline. Most people who live well into old age will one day have to stop driving. Before that day comes, many will voluntarily reduce their driving range to local streets and daytime hours only. Other senior drivers will resist making any adjustments at all. These are the drivers we worry about the most.

Of course, we are all reluctant to take away anyone's independence. We're also acutely aware that if our elder stops driving there usually aren't any good alternatives in most parts of the country. We foresee our lives becoming even more complicated if our older driver has to hang up the keys.

Nevertheless, there may come a time when you have to take the bull by the horns and really take a hard look at how your older loved one is doing behind the wheel.

The best way to do this is to ride along in the passenger seat and take mental notes. As soon as you can, write down your observations and make a note of the time of day you made the drive. If two or three different people can do this and then compare notes, you will have a very good idea of how safe your aging driver is.

Use the Driving Assessment Form to keep track of what you observed and to compare notes. It might be very interesting to see how performance varies between morning and afternoon, for instance.

If your older driver passes with flying colors, congratulations! You can breathe a sigh of relief and worry about something else for a while. Know that you will have to assess again in six months or so, or even earlier if there is an incident.

If you decide that your concerns are valid, try to have a family meeting before you speak with your driver. You will want to decide how best to intervene, what alternative transportation can be arranged, what steps to take first, and who should be the spokesperson. Sometimes it is the person with whom the driver has the best relationship. Sometimes, though, if the conversation is guaranteed to end poorly, a better spokesperson is the family member who lives the most distant and who is least likely to have to "hear about it" every day.

Senior Driving Assessment Form