IMMORTAL Project - Oslo meeting

Update
01/09/2003

IMMORTAL Project, Oslo meeting

The IMMORTAL (Impaired Motorists Roadside Testing and Licensing) project is an EC project aimed at:

1) providing knowledge about driver impairments and their implications for road safety

2) establishing better criteria for licensing as well as methods for detecting impairment among drivers.

The project consists of a variety of deliverables, including a workshop titled ‘Fatigue, sleepiness and reduced alertness as risk factors in driving’ held in September 2003 in Oslo, Norway.

Presenters at the workshop included Dr Paul Jackson from Awake and Dr Adrian Williams from the London Sleep Centre. Dr Williams provided detailed background information on sleep, circadian rhythms, and sleep disorders. A focus of the presentation was a discussion of obstructive sleep apnoea syndrome, a breathing disorder that occurs during sleep, resulting in poor quality of sleep and consequently excessive daytime sleepiness. This disorder affects as many as 4-5% of middle-aged men, who are the group with the highest prevalence.

Our consultants introduced the group to Awake and our approach to driver tiredness. Some believe that the solution to driver tiredness lies in the development of technology to detect sleep (e.g. the ‘Sleeper Beeper’ which detects the driver’s head nodding, or Perclos, a system that monitors eye closure). However, at Awake we believe that the only safe, long-term solution to driver tiredness is to increase awareness of the associated dangers and to provide informed advice on what to do if you feel tired behind the wheel (Stop driving!).

Technology or gadgets that alert the driver when they are falling asleep pick up on the process too late to be useful. By the time a driver’s head is nodding or their eyes are closing they have already been at risk of accident for some time. Moreover, drivers can come to rely on gadgets to ‘protect’ themselves from tiredness, in effect meaning that these gadgets keep tired drivers on the road longer.