# Presentation: 011877

## Cognitive Rehabilitation and Driving

- Karlene Ball
- University of Alabama at Birmingham

## Cognitive Decline

- The possibility of cognitive decline is one of the greatest fears that people have as they age.  Such fears understandably prompt questions about whether such declines are inevitable and what can be done to prevent or even reverse such declines.

## Mental Decline is not a given

- Research over the past two decades suggests that mental decline is not an inevitable aspect of growing older.  In fact, sustaining cognitive activity may be one of the keys to how well we age.

## Protecting against decline

- Stay physically active
- Remain socially active
- Practice daily stress reduction
- Seek help if suffering from depression
- Get plenty of sleep
- Practice good nutrition

## Protecting against decline

- Keep challenging yourself
- Crossword puzzles
- Playing cards, chess, checkers
- Visiting museums
- Playing a musical instrument
- Learning a foreign language
- Reading regularly

## Link between cognitive function and mobility

- What is the impact of cognitive function and cognitive decline on everyday activities that require adequate mobility (e.g., driving)?

## Roybal Center

- Predictions of driving competence, driving habits, and other markers of mobility
- Impact of medical, educational and cognitive interventions on driving competence, mobility, and other everyday activities

## ACTIVE Clinical Trial Advanced Cognitive Training for Independent and Vital Elderly

- <date/time>

**ACTIVE Clinical Trial**** Advanced Cognitive Training for Independent and Vital Elderly**

- 	Primary aim was to test the effectiveness and durability of three cognitive interventions in improving the performance of elderly persons on basic measures of cognition and on measures of cognitively demanding daily activities.

**Notes:**
Extends prior laboratory-based research showing that cognitive training improved the targeted cognitive ability.
Limited evidence to suggest transfer from the targeted cognitive ability to cognitive demanding ADL’s

## Multi-Site Clinical Trial

- Six Field Sites:
- University of Alabama at Birmingham
- Hebrew Rehabilitation Center for the Aged
- Indiana University School of Medicine
- Johns Hopkins University
- Pennsylvania State University
- University of Florida/Wayne State University
- Coordinating Center:
- New England Research Institutes

**Notes:**
Representing the ACTIVE SC
6 field Sites
Coordinating Center
Project Offices at NIA and NINR

## Three cognitive training interventions:

Speed of Processing
Reasoning
Memory

- Speed of Processing
- Reasoning
- Memory

**Interventions**

**Notes:**
Briefly describe each intervention.

## Initial Training Effects

- Each intervention reliably improved the targeted cognitive ability at post test in:
- 87% of Speed of Processing trained
- 74% of Reasoning trained
- 26% of Memory trained

## Primary Result

**Primary Result**

- Expected Decline

- Training Gains

## Significance

- Cognitive interventions helped normal elderly persons perform better on multiple measures of the specific cognitive ability for which they were trained.
- Training gains were comparable to, or greater than, the amount of decline that has been reported in previous studies over a 7 - 14 year period among older adults without dementia.

## Improved Driving Performance

- We are currently collecting accident records for the ACTIVE participants to evaluate the impact of training on driving performance over the subsequent five year period.

## Additional Training Studies

- Speed of Processing training has been shown in several studies to result in:
- Fewer dangerous maneuvers while driving
- Improved hazard detection in simulations
- Faster reaction times to road signs
- Increased mobility

**Design**

## Driving Evaluation

- One mile warm up
- Two loops of 7 mile course
- Overall Rating by Driving Instructor
- 455 item checklist completed by 2 backseat evaluators

## Response Time (Simulator)

## Results Driving - Dangerous Maneuvers

## Conclusions

- Speed of Processing training resulted in:
- Faster Response Time in a driving simulator
- Fewer Dangerous Maneuvers on the road
- Maintenance of improvements for up to 18 months
- Simulator Training resulted in:
- Short term improved performance on skills trained (e.g., signal use, turn positioning)
- Effects had largely dissipated by 18 months

## Driving Cessation

- Ceasing to drive is a very negative outcome for many older adults – frequently leading to depression and reducing quality of life.
- In a large sample of licensed drivers in Maryland, we found that half of the drivers who quit driving over a five year period showed evidence of cognitive decline.
- In fact, cognitive impairments were more likely to lead to driving cessation than crash involvement.

## Mobility

- Several studies have found that speed of processing training extends the safe driving period for older adults.

## Collectively these findings suggest a program of early detection and rehabilitation for age-related cognitive decline.  Such a program would help to sustain independent safe mobility in older adults with associated benefits to quality of life.

**Conclusions**

## Needs

- Education – Older individuals should be made aware of potential age-related changes.
- Identification – Only a small subset of older drivers are impaired, and identification of this subset is feasible.
- Rehabilitation – In many cases training may help to sustain or improve the cognitive abilities needed to drive safely.