Researchers from Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP) and the University of Pennsylvania School of Nursing (Penn Nursing) found that nearly half of adolescents who sought specialty care for a concussion were back to driving when asked approximately two weeks after the injury, even though few had returned to exercise and sports. The findings raise important concerns about the need for evidence-based guidance on safely returning to driving for adolescents with concussion. In the absence of standardized guidelines, providers should include driving as part of post-injury discussions with families.
More than 1.9 million children sustain a concussion each year, with adolescents representing more than 50% of these injuries. Concussions affect cognition and oculomotor function and thus can impair abilities essential to safe driving such as visual scene assessment, processing environmental risks and executing complex tasks.
“We’re looking at this intersection of driving and concussion and see teen drivers returning to what is already a very high risk behavior for them and doing so with an injury known to cause cognitive impairment,” said first author Catherine McDonald, PhD, RN, FAAN a Senior Fellow with CHOP’s Center for Injury Research and Prevention (CIRP) and an Associate Professor of Nursing in the Department of Family and Community Health at Penn Nursing. “This study sought to provide information on what teens and families are actually doing in the absence of structured clinical guidelines.”
