Acute effects of analgesics on driving performance in a highway surrounding depending on age
BERTHELON ; AMATO ; MARIE ; DENISE ; BOCCA
Type de document
COMMUNICATION PAR AFFICHE (AFF)
Langue
anglais
Auteur
BERTHELON ; AMATO ; MARIE ; DENISE ; BOCCA
Résumé / Abstract
Among drugs, the association of codeine/paracetamol could decrease vigilance and thus impair driving performance. However, few experimental study evaluated codeine effects on driving, and they only tested these effects on young healthy drivers whereas elderly people represent a large part of drivers and are used to consume this type of drugs. The effects were evaluated in two groups of 16 subjects, young (20-30 years) and aged (55 to 65 years). One hour of monotonous driving performance was evaluated after 1 dose of codeine/paracetamol (20mg/400mg) intake and compared to a placebo in a double blind and balanced design. Pills were taken at 8AM, highway driving task was performed one hour after at the theoretical plasma peak concentration of the drug. Results showed that the minimal therapeutic dose of codeine/paracetamol differently affect driving performance in function of age. Young subjects performances did not vary after drug intake whereas aged subjects performance were impaired. Moreover, aged subjects seemed to eliminate the drug more slowly than young subjects. These results are in agreement with our past study on the effects of zolpidem revealing that this hypnotic which did not appear at risk for driving in healthy young subjects could be at risk for aged subjects.
