Grant: Doctoral Research Award-PA: Disability Prevention (Auto Collision/Manufacturing)

Vehicular crashes are common in Canada and frequently lead to injury and/or death. Understanding the factors that may contribute to vehicular crashes is important to prevent injury and/or death that may result from vehicular crashes. Both Major Depressive Disorder (MDD) and the psychotropic medications used to treat MDD can induce cognitive and psychomotor disturbances. Consequently, both MDD and psychotropic medications may be detrimental to the task of driving. Presently, there is a paucity of research examining the impact of these variables, specifically in teasing apart the effect of MDD from that of medications. Therefore, the present study seeks to elucidate the influence of MDD and psychotropic medications, such as antidepressants, on driving performance in a clinical population and using a driving simulator. This study will recruit participates who have MDD and are treated successfully with antidepressant medications, MDD participants who are taking antidepressants but are not successfully treated, MDD participants who are untreated, and healthy controls. All participants will complete a battery of questionnaires assessing driving habits, depression, and cognitive and psychomotor functioning. Lastly, all participants will complete a 30 min simulated drive in the laboratory. Participants will complete all measures again at a 6-month follow-up. We expect that individuals with MDD who are treated unsuccessfully or not treated at all with antidepressant medications will display poor performance compared to controls, and participants whose MDD has been treated successfully with antidepressant medications will not display impairments in driving performance compared to controls. The findings of this study could lead to advances in the health of populations; namely, this study could be a starting point in raising awareness of the impact of psychotropic medications and mental illnesses on driving performance as to prevent future injury and disability.