Declines in fatal crashes of older drivers: Changes in crash risk and survivability

• Published in: Accident analysis and prevention 2011-05, Vol.43 (3), p.666-674
• Main Authors: Cheung, Ivan, McCartt, Anne T.
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Accidents, Traffic - mortality; Accidents, Traffic - prevention & control; Adult; Age Factors; Aged; Aged, 80 and over; Cause of Death; Crash trends; Crashes; Cross-Sectional Studies; Drivers; Fatal; Female; Humans; Injuries; Male; Middle Aged; Multiple Trauma - mortality; Multiple Trauma - prevention & control; Occupant injuries; Odds Ratio; Older driver crashes; Older drivers; Risk; Survivability; Survival Analysis; Trends; United States
• ISSN: 0001-4575; 1879-2057
• DOI: 10.1016/j.aap.2010.10.010

▶ Older drivers have experienced sharp decline in their fatal crash involvements. ▶ Their decreased risk extends to nonfatal injury and property-damage-only crashes. ▶ Odds for older drivers dying in a given police-reported crash has declined sharply. Previous research has found that older driver fatal crash involvement rates per licensed driver declined substantially in the United States during 1997–2006 and declined much faster than the rate for middle-age drivers. The current study examined whether the larger-than-expected decline for older drivers extended to nonfatal crashes and whether the decline in fatal crash risk reflects lower likelihood of crashing or an improvement in survivability of the crashes that occur. Trends in the rates of passenger vehicle crash involvements per 100,000 licensed drivers for drivers 70 and older (older drivers) were compared with trends for drivers ages 35–54 (middle-age drivers). Fatal crash information was obtained from the Fatality Analysis Reporting System for years 1997–2008, and nonfatal crash information was obtained from 13 states with good reporting information for years 1997–2005. Analysis of covariance models compared trends in annual crash rates for older drivers relative to rates for middle-age drivers. Differences in crash survivability were measured in terms of the odds of fatality given a crash each year, and the historical trends for older versus middle-age drivers were compared. Fatal crash involvement rates declined for older and middle-age drivers during 1997–2008 (1997–2005 for the 13 state subsample), but the decline for drivers 70 and older far exceeded the decline for drivers ages 35–54 (37 versus 23 percent, nationally; 22 versus 1 percent, 13 states). Nonfatal injury crash involvement rates showed similarly larger-than-expected declines for older drivers in the 13 state subsample, but the differences were smaller and not statistically significant (27 percent reduction for older drivers versus 16 percent for middle-age drivers). Property-damage-only crash involvement rates declined for older drivers (10 percent) but increased for middle-age drivers (1 percent). In 1997, older drivers were 3.5 times more likely than middle-age drivers to die in police-reported crashes (6.2 versus 1.8 deaths per 1000 crashes), but this difference was reduced during the 9-year study period to 2.9 times, as the rate of older drivers dying in a crash declined (5.5 deaths per 1000 crashes in 2005) and the death risk