Elderly drivers may face 5 yearly cognitive and eyesight tests
Although this proposal, as reported in today’s Daily Mail, may at first seem worrying for the elderly driver, I’m sure most people would agree that it makes sense to ensure both eyesight and mental skills for the elderly are fit for the purpose of driving. Driving is a potentially dangerous activity, and we should all take care to avoid driving if unfit in some way. This can include our emotional and our mental states, as well as physical fitness. At no matter what age any one of us can be struck down with a mental illness, such as depression, which temporarily makes us unfit to drive, and we should each be responsible enough to accept that, just as we would have to if we broke a limb. Therefore, although these measures might at first appear to be discriminatory towards the elderly, it is a sad fact of life that our mental faculties, as well as our eyesight, do decline with age. However, just as we know we can improve our brain power with mental exercises, so all of us can do something to maintain our driving ability by raising our standard of driving whilst we are still young, and ensuring we have regular refresher lessons, at least every 10 years, to help us to retain that ability. Any driver over the age of 55 can have reactions as fast, often faster, than someone much younger if they have learned to spot and react to any potential hazard much earlier, thereby cancelling ‘thinking time’ from the stopping distances table. Make sure you are a proactive, as opposed to a reactive driver. And do ensure you have regular eyesight check-ups and that you wear your glasses if prescribed for driving - you know it makes sense!
Click on this link to read the full Daily Mail article:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?in_article_id=510738&in_page_id=1770
