Dementia severity and on-road assessment: Briefly revisited

Objective: Drivers with dementia should cease driving if unsafe. This report aims to add to the evidence concerning use of global dementia severity as an indicator of driving performance. Method: One hundred and fifteen drivers were assessed via standardised on-road assessment. Descriptive and comparative statistics analysed age and global dementia severity of the drivers against the on-road assessment outcome. Results: On-road assessment outcomes conformed to previous clinical guidelines in outer limits of dementia severity. Drivers with negligible dementia passed the assessment, those with moderate dementia failed. The pass or fail outcomes for drivers with very mild and mild dementia were equivocal. Conclusion: This study supports previous recommendations of cessation or continued driving for those in outer margins of dementia severity. Use of severity levels for driving recommendations, in the absence of on-road assessment, risks either continued unsafe driving or premature cessation for individual drivers with very mild or mild dementia.