Driver cognitive evaluation
The Font Medical Centre under the direction of Dr Carlos Flaviel Font is the first Quebec clinic to offer cognitive tests for professional or lay drivers. The transportation domain faces a diminishing pool of qualified drivers as well as an increase in the number of accidents, litigation, and overall costs. Transit authorities, municipalities, trucking companies, and other commercial or industrial delivery services, insurers as well as evaluators, doctors, and neurologists, the Société de l’Assurance Automobile du Québec, families, and the individuals concerned can benefit from an in-depth risk evaluation leading to quick and relevant decisions in safety matters.
This multipurpose examination provides answers to any person on his/her driving abilities that may be affected by an often-undiagnosed illness. What does your driving test not tell you?
What is a cognitive evaluation?
Safe driving is a complex task requiring various cognitive functions. The evaluation completed on a tablet enables one to predict a person’s driving behavior by measuring the cognitive functions required for safe driving with simple game-like tasks. 4 tasks allow the measurement of 11 of the 12 cognitive functions essential to drivers identified by the Canadian Council of motor transport administrators (CCMTA) except for long-term memory.
- Divided attention
- Selective attention
- Sustained attention (vigilance)
- Short-term or passive memory
- Working memory (the active component of short-term memory)
- Choice/complex reaction time
- Tracking
- Visuospatial abilities
- Executive functioning
- Central executive functioning
- Visual information processing
Why?
- Pre-hiring
- Probationary period
- Mentoring & training
- Periodic evaluation
- Return to work
- Post-incident
- Reasonable cause
- Performance evaluations
- A doctor whose patient has suffered a stroke without any apparent aftereffects, but complains of concentration difficulties or new memory problems;
- A company that needs a pre-employment exam to fill a position that requires a professional class driver’s licence;
- A neurologist must professionally evaluate a patient’s driving abilities;
- An aging driver with initial memory loss leading to safe driving concerns;
- A person involved in a traffic accident for which the confirmation of any cognitive impairment (judgment, control, reaction time, memory) is required;
- A patient wishing to ascertain and prove the absence of any cognitive impairment (judgment, control, reaction time, memory).
The advantages
- Improved knowledge of the skills of the drivers
- Proactively ascertain fleet risks
- Early detection of the risk of impairment
- Reduction of incidents
- Recruitment & retention of quality drivers
- Improved driver retention and performance
- Make informed decisions based on objective data
- Foster safe return to work
- Saves money
- Paperless solution
THE BENEFITS *
SKILLED AND PRODUCTIVE DRIVERS
- Less than 2% of drivers evaluated by ExceleRATE can no longer take the road. In most cases, drivers are able to return to work following medical care or corrective training.
- Underlying medical conditions identified were not detected in routine medical examinations as recent as 2 weeks prior to assessment.
- The Vitals in-office component indicates that a driver is fit to drive following his or her assessment with a 95% confidence level.
SKILLED DRIVERS
- Fleet managers reported a “significant” improvement in the quality of drivers who were assessed using ExceleRATE when hired as well as an “overall” improvement in fleet driver performance when using ExceleRATE for periodic evaluations.
INCIDENT REDUCTION
- 23% of drivers flagged by ExceleRATE were involved in 1 or more preventable incidents in the 3 months prior to the assessment.
- In the context of an Alberta fleet with 2100 drivers:
- Total collisions decreased by 8% and preventable collisions by 4%.
- The number of collisions per 100,000 km decreased by 4%.
- Passengers gave a perceived security rating of 90%, which exceeds the performance standard of 80%.
- In the context of a study conducted by driveABLE at a school transportation company in the state of Wisconsin in the United States with 117 drivers, 40% of those flagged by ExceleRATE and with whom no intervention took place were involved in an avoidable “extreme” incident within 12 months following the assessment.
Note: Amounts paid to third parties related to fault liability are not included in the above.
BETTER DRIVER RETENTION
- In the context of a commercial fleet using ExceleRATE to assess 2,400 candidates over a 6-year period, retention of hired drivers was improved by 4%.
SAVES MONEY
- In the context of an Alberta fleet with 2100 drivers:
- $530 immediate hiring savings for each driver hired.
- Asset costs of $440,000 saved from reduced total collisions.
- Asset costs of $150,000 saved from the number of preventable collisions.
Note: These costs exclude legal fees, CNESST fees, administrative fees and amounts paid to third parties related to fault liability.
*The above data is for illustrative purposes only. Each case/fleet is unique and results and savings will vary. No guarantee is given.
- The predictive value of DCAT Mobile is confirmed by first-rate statistics. A study by Bakhtiani et al. (2020) showed a 73% accuracy rate when identifying capable or unfit drivers among an elderly population. This predictive value can help you make informed decisions about your patients’ driving skills.
- DCAT Mobile also has a wider scope. Recent studies such as Tandon et al. (2022) demonstrate strong predictive value across several demographic strata. In addition, the test used by Scott et al. (2023) to predict risk in a group of commercial drivers demonstrated an accuracy rate of 80% illustrating its usefulness.
A sample of the companies using this evaluation
Book an appointment today
Proactively measuring risk is a challenge. We all wish to safely do our job over the long run. Together we can help avoid and detect any health issue before it worsens.
