Lane Fox Respiratory Unit / Sleep Disorders Centre, Guy's and St Thomas' NHS Foundation Trust, Westminster Bridge Road, London, SE1 7EH, UK.
Faculty of Life Sciences and Medicine, King's College London, London, UK.
Sleep Breath. 2019 Dec;23(4):1227-1232. doi: 10.1007/s11325-019-01810-w. Epub 2019 Mar 19.
Excessive daytime sleepiness (EDS) is a contributing factor to road traffic accidents. It is commonly assessed using self-administered questionnaires. These assessments are important information when discussing with the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency (DVLA) about fitness-to-drive. We hypothesised that patients may be confounded in their assessments after being informed about these potential implications.
This was a prospective single-centre study. Patients attending clinics for sleep-disordered breathing were asked to fill in the Epworth Sleepiness Scale (ESS) and the Stanford Sleepiness Scale (SSS). Following their consultation, patients were informed about EDS in the context of driving and that the DVLA might request information based on their self-assessed sleepiness. They were then asked to complete the same questionnaires again. Parameters recorded included age, gender, body mass index (BMI), driving licence holder, and collar size. An ESS score above 10 points was defined as EDS.
One hundred twenty-two subjects were studied (age 59.4 years (15.2); 72 males; BMI 32.1 kg/m (8.3), driving licence held for 25.2 years (20.6) (n = 94); collar size 42.7 cm (5.0)). There was no difference in the ESS [8 (8) vs 8 (8) points; p = 0.289] or the SSS [2 (2) vs 2 (2) points; p = 0.320] between the two occasions, although seven patients (5.7%) changed their scores from "sleepy" to "non-sleepy" and four patients (3.3%) from "non-sleepy" to "sleepy".
Providing patients with information about the risk of driving in the context of sleepiness does not significantly change how they score their symptoms using self-administered questionnaires; only about 9.0% of the patients had inconsistent results.
日间嗜睡（EDS）是导致道路交通事故的一个因素。它通常通过自我管理的问卷进行评估。这些评估是在与驾驶员和车辆许可局（DVLA）讨论驾驶能力时的重要信息。我们假设，在告知患者这种潜在影响后，他们可能会对评估感到困惑。
这是一项前瞻性单中心研究。被邀请参加睡眠呼吸障碍诊所的患者被要求填写 Epworth 嗜睡量表（ESS）和斯坦福嗜睡量表（SSS）。在咨询后，患者了解了 EDS 在驾驶方面的影响，并且 DVLA 可能会根据他们自我评估的嗜睡情况要求提供信息。然后，他们被要求再次完成相同的问卷。记录的参数包括年龄、性别、体重指数（BMI）、驾照持有者和衣领尺寸。ESS 评分超过 10 分被定义为 EDS。
共研究了 122 名患者（年龄 59.4 岁（15.2）；72 名男性；BMI 32.1kg/m²（8.3），持有驾照 25.2 年（20.6）（n=94）；衣领尺寸 42.7cm（5.0））。两次评估的 ESS[8（8）与 8（8）分；p=0.289]或 SSS[2（2）与 2（2）分；p=0.320]无差异，尽管 7 名患者（5.7%）的评分从“嗜睡”变为“非嗜睡”，4 名患者（3.3%）从“非嗜睡”变为“嗜睡”。
向患者提供关于睡眠相关驾驶风险的信息并不会显著改变他们使用自我管理问卷评估症状的方式；只有约 9.0%的患者结果不一致。
