"Eyesight Care and Safe Driving"
Today was the traditional appointment with World Sight Day promoted by the World Health Organization (WHO) with the aim of raising awareness about the problems linked to this precious gift.
With this aim, today Vision+ Onlus and CDV, in collaboration with CBM Italia and with the support of Aimo (and the sponsorship of the Municipality and Province of Milan and Rotary District 2040 of Rotary International), promoted the conference on the subject of “Eyesight Care and Safe Driving” held in the Palazzo dei Giureconsulti in Milan. Taking part in the meeting, which was moderated by Radio24 journalist and wellbeing expert Nicoletta Carbone, were various important personalities in the optical and health world.
The various initiatives promoted included an important survey that Commissione Difesa Vista commissioned the Bicocca University to carry out on “Correct eyesight compensation for safe driving”, which brought to light disturbing information about the wellbeing of drivers’ eyesight. Knight of Labor Vittorio Tabacchi explained that “the data showed that 30% of drivers do not have the vision capabilities necessary for driving a vehicle safely and that the eye exams carried out when issuing or renewing a driver license do not measure many of these capabilities; in other words, in practice they are not capable of ascertaining if the person tested is satisfactory from the point of view of vision”.
In fact every eye disease leads to vision defects that affect the ability to drive, which was the basis of the talk “The impact of eye diseases on the ability to drive safely” by Prof. Francesco Bandello, director of the ophthalmological clinic at San Raffaele Hospital. “It is essential that all players – eye specialists and patients - know about these defects and correct them”, the professor explained. “Eye specialists must recognize, correct and advise, and patients-drivers (but not only them!) must be aware of the vision defects that can nullify the capacity to see properly by having regular eye exams and undergoing procedures for correcting vision defects”.
Simple but essential advices given that “Istat/ACI (2009) data show that in Italy 59.16% of road accidents can be attributed to causes that are directly or indirectly linked to impaired vision”, stated Silvio Maffioletti and Renato Pocaterra, editors of the Bicocca University research. CDV has therefore taken action at the relevant institutions – the Ministry of Transport, Ministry of Health, the Chamber of Deputies and the Senate – to urge the approval of regulations that provide for the introduction of more effective tests for assessing eyesight capabilities and to suggest that these tests should be carried out by specialized or properly trained eye care professionals.
From this aspect, it was interesting as well as essential to investigate the “New legislation on eyesight requirements for renewing driver licenses” in the talk by Dr. Luigi Marino, head of the Ophthalmological Unit at the Istituto Clinico Città Studi. “The most important news with regard to the implementation of the recent Ministerial Decree concern the role that Specialized Ophthalmologists will finally play”, Marino explained. “By being in line with the most avant-garde European countries and the UN-WHO Campaign for reducing road accidents, better testing of drivers prevents accidents. In addition to vision acuity and field of vision, the other tests that were introduced are vision at dusk, sensitivity to glare and contrast, and ocular motility”.
Greater attention to eye health, specific checks, stricter exams for driver licenses performed by ad hoc professionals: these are all essential elements for improving the ratio between eyesight and driving. And these should be joined by discoveries in the automotive field that help drivers to see better. «There are new technologies for more efficient headlights that allow you to see and be seen more clearly», explained Emilio Deleidi, Editor-in-Chief of ‘Quattroruote’. “Not to mention the ‘amplified’ night-vision systems that are already available. And the prospects for further developments in the future should be investigated”.
At the end of the Conference Anna Anzani attended the presentation of the “Wellbeing in Sight” awards to personalities and organizations that were selected by the Vision+ Onlus Scientific Committee because they had taken an interest in, or devoted particular attention to, the subject of eye health in various fields and sectors.
