|
|
 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Background Reports suggest that people who drive while intoxicated by alcohol may do so repeatedly. We hypothesized that persons arrested for driving while impaired might be at increased risk for death in an alcohol-related motor vehicle crash. To evaluate this possibility, we studied the deaths of drivers in alcohol-related motor vehicle accidents in North Carolina over a 10-year period.
Methods We compared drivers who died in motor vehicle crashes from 1980 through 1989 and who had blood alcohol concentrations of at least 20 mg per deciliter (4.3 mmol per liter), referred to as the case drivers, with those who died in crashes but had blood alcohol concentrations below 20 mg per deciliter, referred to as the control drivers. We identified case drivers and control drivers through the state Medical Examiner System. We then searched North Carolina driver-history files for the five years before each death to identify arrests for driving while impaired.
Results We linked a total of 1646 case drivers and 1474 control drivers to their driver-history files. Case drivers were more likely than control drivers to have been arrested for driving while impaired (26 percent vs. 3 percent). After we controlled for potential confounding variables, case drivers 21 to 34 years of age were 4.3 times more likely (95 percent confidence interval, 2.7 to 6.8) than control drivers to have been arrested for driving while impaired; case drivers 35 years of age or older were 11.7 times more likely (95 percent confidence interval, 6.8 to 20.1). The strength of the association appeared to increase with the number of prior arrests. Case drivers were also more likely than the general population of currently licensed drivers to have been arrested.
Conclusions Arrests for driving while impaired substantially increase the risk of eventual death in an alcohol-related crash. Aggressive intervention in the cases of people arrested for driving while impaired may decrease the likelihood of a future fatal alcohol-related crash.
Source Information
From the Epidemic Intelligence Service, Division of Field Epidemiology, Epidemiology Program Office, and the National Center for Injury Prevention and Control, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Atlanta (R.D.B.); the Environmental Epidemiology Section (P.D.M.), Injury Control Section (T.B.C., M.J.P.), and Division of Statistics and Information Services (S.W.), North Carolina Department of Environment, Health, and Natural Resources, Raleigh; and the University of North Carolina Highway Safety Research Center, Chapel Hill (C.P.).
Address reprint requests to Dr. Brewer at the Division of Unintentional Injury Prevention, National Center for Injury Prevention and Control, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 4770 Buford Hwy., N.E., Mailstop K-63, Atlanta, GA 30341.
Related Letters:
Meningitis Due to Ceftriaxone-Resistant
Lonks J. R., Durkin M. R., Meyerhoff A. N., Medeiros A. A.
Extract |
Full Text
N Engl J Med 1995;
332:893-894, Mar 30, 1995.
Correspondence
This article has been cited by other articles:
HOME | SUBSCRIBE | SEARCH | CURRENT ISSUE | PAST ISSUES | COLLECTIONS | PRIVACY | HELP | beta.nejm.org Comments and questions? Please contact us. The New England Journal of Medicine is owned, published, and copyrighted © 2008 Massachusetts Medical Society. All rights reserved. |
Previous
