Changing driving habits could be early sign of dementia

By Stephen Beech

Changing driving habits could be an early indicator of dementia, suggests new research.

People with a precursor to Alzheimer’s disease start getting behind the wheel less - especially at night - and stick to familiar routes, according to the study.

GPS trackers spotted brain health issues better than age or memory tests alone, say American scientists.

And adding driving data to the mix increased the accuracy in detecting cognitive decline to 87%.

Monitoring how older people drive could help catch brain changes early - before any crashes happen, according to the research team.

Study author Dr. Ganesh Babulal said: “Early identification of older drivers who are at risk for accidents is a public health priority, but identifying people who are unsafe is challenging and time-consuming.

“We found that using a GPS data tracking device, we could more accurately determine who had developed cognitive issues than looking at just factors such as age, cognitive test scores and whether they had a genetic risk factor related to Alzheimer’s disease.”

The study, published in the journal Neurology, involved 56 people with mild cognitive impairment, which is a precursor to Alzheimer’s, and 242 cognitively healthy people with an average age of 75.

All the participants were driving at least once a week at the start of the study.

Participants agreed to take thinking skills tests and to have the data tracking device installed on their vehicles.

They were then followed for more than three years.

While the driving patterns of the two groups were similar at the start of the study, over time older adults with mild cognitive impairment had greater reductions in how many times they drove each month, how often they drove at night and how much they varied their routine in where they drove.

The research team used driving factors such as medium and maximum trip distance, how often people went above the speed limit and how much they varied their routine to predict whether a person had developed mild cognitive impairment with 82% accuracy.

Once they added in the factors of age and other demographics, cognitive test scores and whether people had a gene associated with Alzheimer’s, the accuracy improved to 87%.

In comparison, using all of those factors without any driving information resulted in 76% accuracy.

Dr. Babulal, of Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, Missouri, added: “Looking at people’s daily driving behavior is a relatively low-burden, unobtrusive way to monitor people’s cognitive skills and ability to function.

“This could help identify drivers who are at risk earlier for early intervention, before they have a crash or near miss, which is often what happens now.

"Of course, we also need to respect people’s autonomy, privacy and informed decision-making and ensure ethical standards are met.”