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Well-being
Medication
and road
safety
Driving is a complex tasks and it is essential
to be able to control psychomotor, cognitive
and behavioural activity in addition to visual
and hearing perception. It is also necessary
to foresee or anticipate circumstances that
might occur and resolve them successfully
to prevent accidents.
If, in addition to these driving diffculties
we add other ingredients, such as the
consumption of drugs, the probabilities of
having an accident increase considerably.
Drugs combined with driving could repre-
sent a major risk.
Drugs
The negative effects of drugs on driving
capabilities are called undesirable effects,
although the intensity differs from one per-
son to another.
The main side effects of drugs that could
negatively affect driving ability are:
•
Sedative effect: drowsiness, diminished
alertness, longer reaction time, etc.
•
Visual alterations, cloudy vision, ac-
commodation dysfunctions.
•
Hearing alterations: buzzing in the ear,
transitory diminished auditory sensitivi-
ty, and tinnitus.
•
Anticholinergic effects: vertigo, insom-
nia, headaches, etc.
•
Neuropsychiatric reactions: nervous-
ness, confusion, depression, beha-
vioural alterations, etc.
•
Circulatory alterations: arrhythmia,
hypotension, cardiac arrest.
•
Hypoglycaemia.
•
Psychomotor restlessness: convul-
sions, agitation, muscle spasms, etc.
When a physician prescribes medication,
we should describe our driving habits and
should also read the prospectus very care-
fully. If the physician prescribes a treatment,
it is very important to fnd out if it is going to
affect our driving abilities.
Of all the prescribed drugs, psychotropic
drugs are the ones that could have the
most detrimental effects on drivers.
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