The Association Between Substance Use Disorder Patients with Cognitive Impairment and Road Traffic Accidents

Abstract

Road traffic accidents, a global problem, tends to continuously increase in societies where vehicles are common modes of transportation. Factors such as human, vehicles and environmental have been associated with road traffic accidents. Drugs are one of the major causes of cognitive impairment resulting in traffic accidents. Objective: To study the association of drug addicts with cognitive impairment and road traffic accidents. Secondary objectives were to explore 1) factors contributing to road traffic accidents in drug addicts and 2) numbers and the proportion of substance used disorder patients with cognitive impairment. Methods: This study was a cross-sectional analytical study. Data were collected from all types of drug-addicted patients admitted to seven drug treatment facilities across the country. The sample consisted of 607 participants. The research tools were composed of five questionnaires, including personal characteristics questionnaire, Trail Marking Test A & B, the Stroop Color-Word test, Digit Symbol (WAIS-III) and road traffic accidents questionnaire. The Personal characteristics and road traffic accident questionnaires were validated by three independent experts and the value for Cronbach's alpha efficiency was 0.88. The other sets of questionnaires were the standardized psychological tests. Data were analyzed and presented by descriptive statistics, comprising frequency distribution, percentage, mean, standard deviation, and analytical statistics, comprising chi-square test (c²), Fisher's exact test, odds ratio and 95%CI. Data were collected between October 15, 2022 - January 31, 2023. Results: Factors affecting road traffic accidents were driving experience with less than 20 years, by which road traffic accidents were reported as high as 18.3% and had a statistically significant relationship with road traffic accidents at the .05 level. The top three most addictive drugs that caused cognitive impairment were methamphetamine, alcohol and heroin at 43.7%, 23.6% and 2.1%, respectively. Patients who used methamphetamine, alcohol and heroin had 2.34, 2.30 and 0.44 times the odds for cognitive impairment, respectively than that of patients using other drugs. Conclusion: The results of this study did not find an association between cognitive impairment and a history of road traffic accidents. However, it was found that methamphetamine and alcohol dependence patients were more likely to have cognitive impairment than of patients using other drugs.