Driving safety: concerns and experiences of parents of adolescent drivers with type 1 diabetes.
Driving is a dangerous activity for adolescents, perhaps being even more precarious for adolescents with type 1 diabetes due to the possibility of extreme blood glucose (BG). There is no available data on adolescent driving safety concerns and type 1 diabetes. To begin addressing this issue, we surveyed parents regarding their observations and concerns. Seventy-two parents (87.5% mothers) of adolescent drivers aged 16-19 with type 1 diabetes provided analyzable data. Females comprised 36% of their adolescents, with 74% using pump therapy. In the past year, 13 and 84% of parents reported that their adolescent had experienced severe or moderate disruptive hypoglycemia, respectively. Over half (56%) of the parents reported moderate to extreme worry about how diabetes impacted their adolescent's driving, while only 21% of parents thought their adolescents had similar concerns (p = 0.037). Almost one third (31%) of parents thought their adolescent need not treat low BG until it fell below 70 mg/dL, 13% thought their adolescent could safely drive with BG below 65 mg/dL. And, 31 and 14% of parents, respectively, reported their adolescent had been in a collision or stopped by the police in the past year, which they attributed to both hypo- and hyperglycemia. Adolescents reportedly took steps to prevent hypo- and hyperglycemia while driving, but more aggressively avoided hypoglycemia (p < 0.001). While this data is limited, lacking a non-diabetic control group and randomized sample, it does suggest that driving and adolescent type 1 diabetes deserve further attention and investigation.
Department of Psychiatry and Neurobehavioral Sciences, University of Virginia Health System, Charlottesville, VA 22908, USA. djc4f@virginia.edu
Daniel J
DJ
Cox
Linda A
LA
Gonder-Frederick
Jaclyn A
JA
Shepard
Laura K
LK
Campbell
Karen A
KA
Vajda
D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D001007:Anxiety / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000209:etiology; D001290:Attitude; D001334:Automobile Driving / Q000523:psychology; D003922:Diabetes Mellitus, Type 1 / Q000523:psychology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008016:Life Change Events; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D010287:Parent-Child Relations; D010465:Perception; D012449:Safety; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires; D055815:Young Adult