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Illustration: Rafael
López |
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Following the Road to Safety
Dr. Emma Ferrer was becoming afraid to drive. Miami, Florida, traffic seemed to be getting worse and other drivers were definitely getting ruder. "I took the bus, I took cabs.I was reluctant to get in my car," says the 72-year-old retired anesthesiologist. "I was becoming uptight." The fear bothered Ferrer. It was an unusual feeling for the Cuban native, who immigrated to the United States in 1969 and went back to medical school in her late 30s so she could practice medicine in her new country. "I have been driving since I was very young and I was always a confident driver before," she says. So when she heard about the AARP Driver Safety Program, she made arrangements to attend a course taught in Spanish, 40 miles from her home. "There are a lot of drivers here who don't care," says Ferrer. "The red light doesn't mean anything to them. The stop sign doesn't mean anything. I needed to learn how to defend myself." She learned that, and much more in the course taught by instructor Gabino Garrido. The first lesson she learned was not to get angry with other drivers. Anger can escalate to violence. "When they pass by and make [an obscene] sign, I learned to ignore them,'' she says. She relearned driving rules she thought she already knew and picked up some new tips, as well. For example, she learned to keep her front wheels straight when waiting in the middle of an intersection to make a left turn. If a car's wheels are turned, and it is hit from behind or the driver's foot slips off the brake, the car will move toward where the wheels point-into the path of oncoming traffic. "I never knew that," says Ferrer.
She also learned how age affects hearing, sight, and reaction times and how to compensate for it. Ferrer now leaves more room between her car and others and spends more time planning her driving routes whenever possible, avoiding riskier left turns and streets with heavy traffic or construction. Thanks to the course, her confidence has returned and she finds herself driving more. And, as a resident of one of the 37 states with a mandatory discount for older drivers who complete a driving refresher course, she is eligible for a discount on her auto insurance. "From beginning to end, it was a super course," Ferrer says. "I will refer all my friends to the course." It might be a tough sell, however. AARP driving instructors across the country are having trouble persuading Hispanics to take the course in Spanish, and finding Spanish-speaking volunteers to teach the courses is also difficult. "We are not quite sure why," says Brian Greenberg, the program's national consultant. "There is no testing involved and participants have fun sharing their driving experiences." Rosa de León, an El Paso, Texas, native and AARP driving instructor, spends a lot of time speaking on Spanish radio stations and visiting senior centers and churches, trying to convince everyone she meets to take her course in Spanish. Frequently, she will talk 10 people into signing up, only to have them cancel at the last minute. "But I don't give up," says León. "I believe in the program." The course is effective. Studies show those who attend have substantially fewer accidents and get fewer tickets. But, instructors report, most people don't realize how much the course will help them until after they have attended. People are often in denial about normal physical changes of aging that have impaired their driving skills. Although people over 55, as a group, have fewer total automobile accidents than younger people do, they have more accidents per mile driven than drivers between 35 and 54. Moreover, around age 75, the number of accidents per mile rises sharply. "Most people know something is happening [to their driving skills]," says Gabino Garrido. "But they don't know where their weaknesses are." Garrido and other instructors teach attendees ways to compensate for the effects of aging on driving and how to avoid the most common mistakes made by seniors. They also re-teach some of the useful tricks that people may have learned in driver's education classes-decades ago-but forgot. "When you finish the class, you will know who has the right of way, how to turn to the left [safely] and how to change lanes," Garrido says, "the three biggest mistakes the elderly make." Now, read about the steps some states are taking to reduce risks for older drivers, take our driving knowledge quiz and see these additional sites. |
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