As we have been discussing on this blog for the last few days, the U.S. House of Representatives, Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, held hearings on July 24 on medically unfit truckers. Click here for the hearing information. In this blog, we will discuss some examples of commercial drivers with medical conditions and why these are dangerous.
The GAO found numerous CDL drivers with serious medical conditions. One was a bus driver from Florida that continued to have a CDL and was being hired as a substitute bus driver. This man receives disability benefits for breathing problems that require him to use three daily inhalers and that he claims he, “occasionally blacks outs and forgets things.” This man should not be driving because he could have a breathing problem while on the road and black out. Further, this guy does not have a medical certificate which is required by the DOT to continue to have an active CDL.
Another case was a truck driver from Florida that receives a disability for multiple sclerosis who hauls circus equipment to different shows. Not only does this driver not have the required medical certificate, his medical condition causes fatigue and this can be very dangerous with a driver that travels all over the U.S. The driver could fall asleep and cause a major accident. Without a medical certificate it is impossible to know if the driver has any other conditions that would make him a very dangerous CDL driver to put on the road.
Another disturbing account was a truck driver in Maryland who receives a disability for being 100 percent deaf received a CDL license. The medical examiner claimed that this was an error. This obviously very dangerous for obvious reasons.
Many disabilities can affect an individual’s ability to be a commercial driver. While as advocates for the injured we would have to agree with the DOT that not all disabilities make someone exempt from receiving a CDL license, there are several disabilities, like fatigue, complete deafness and breathing problems that raise serious doubt on whether an individual is fit to have a CDL.
Fatigue is a perfect example. The bulk of trucker related regulations, focus on preventing fatigue. See http://semi-accident.com/fatigue.html To enforce those regulations while allowing someone who has abnormal fatigue to get a CDL, is incongruous. Would not a simple cross referencing of Federal Government data bases eliminate this problem? While Social Security does allow for certain trial returns to work, clearly those returns (if they involve a CDL) should be monitored with the same degree of zeal that the Social Security Administration too often uses to deny deserving people’s benefits.
Each year 5,300 people die and 126,000 people are injured in accidents involving commercial drivers and twelve percent of these accidents are caused by a CDL driver having fatigue, heart attack or a physical impairment. It is important for the DOT to take CDL licensing seriously and consider more thorough evaluations.
In our next blog, we examine the specific requirements to receive a CDL and the NTSB’s recommendations.
Regulators scolded on medically unfit truckers
Date: 07/24/2008 07:45 PM
By JOAN LOWY
Associated Press Writer
WASHINGTON (AP) _ House lawmakers scolded federal regulators Thursday for failing to implement recommendations made in 2001 that were designed to keep medically unfit commercial truck and bus drivers off the nation’s highways.
House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee Chairman James Oberstar, D-Minn., told Rose McMurray, the chief safety officer for the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration, that deaths and injuries caused by medically unfit drivers are “on your conscience” because the agency has taken so long to act.
“I think if your agency had a safety mission and a safety mind-set it wouldn’t have taken you eight years,” Oberstar told McMurray at a hearing, demanding that she “carry back to your agency” his message to “get people moving.”
He said the agency’s efforts to fulfill the eight recommendations made by the National Transportation Safety Board “have been begrudging and painstakingly slow. … The progress has been just about negligible.”
McMurray said the agency has proposed one rule and is close to proposing another to address two of the recommendations — to merge the licensing and medical certification of commercial drivers, and to create a national registry of examiners approved to issue medical certificates — and has made progress on two other recommendations. However, she said it will be about three years before progress is evident on the remaining four recommendations.
“We have to make sure we do this right and we have to ensure there are not unintended consequences,” McMurray said.
The NTSB made the recommendations in response to a 1999 motorcoach accident in New Orleans that killed 22, and put them on the agency’s “most wanted” list in 2003.
In the New Orleans motorcoach accident, the NTSB said the bus driver, Frank Bedell, 46, suffered life-threatening kidney and heart conditions but held a valid license and medical certificate. A passenger recounted seeing the driver slumped in his seat moments before the crash.
Tractor-trailer and bus drivers have suffered seizures, heart attacks or unconscious spells while behind the wheel. Such illnesses have been a critical factor in thousands of serious truck accidents.
The NTSB recommended that examiners who certify drivers as medically fit be qualified and know what to look for, and that a system be set up to track medical certificate applications and prevent drivers from doctor shopping.
A study by the House committee found that it’s so easy to fabricate the medical certificates required to operate commercial trucks and buses that there’s almost no incentive for drivers to obtain a legitimate document.
There are so few controls over how drivers obtain medical certificates that it’s “relatively easy for a motivated commercial driver to circumvent the physical examination requirement,” the study found. Nor is there any database or central repository which would allow state inspectors to verify the legitimacy of a medical certificate.
“Because so few attempts are made to authenticate a certificate, there is little risk that a driver will be caught if he or she forges or adulterates a certificate,” the study said.
The study was based on a sample of 614 medical certificates obtained from truck drivers at roadside inspections in California, Illinois and Ohio. The committee’s staff attempted to contact the examiners named on the medical certificates but could only verify 407 as valid.
One Ohio doctor contacted by the committee said forgery of medical certificates is so commonplace “no one gets alarmed by it anymore.”
Hundreds of thousands of drivers carry commercial licenses even though they also qualify for full federal disability payments, according to a U.S. safety study disclosed by The Associated Press earlier this week.
The Government Accountability Office said in the study that 563,000 commercial drivers were determined by the Veterans Affairs Department, Labor Department or Social Security Administration to also be eligible for full disability benefits over health issues. It said disability doesn’t necessarily mean a driver is unfit to operate a commercial vehicle, but its investigators found alarming examples that raised doubts about the safety of the nation’s highways.
___
On the Net:
House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee: http://transportation.house.gov/
http://semi-accident.net
Copyright 2008 The Associated Press.
By JOAN LOWY
Associated Press Writer
WASHINGTON (AP) _ House lawmakers scolded federal regulators Thursday for failing to implement recommendations made in 2001 that were designed to keep medically unfit commercial truck and bus drivers off the nation’s highways.
House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee Chairman James Oberstar, D-Minn., told Rose McMurray, the chief safety officer for the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration, that deaths and injuries caused by medically unfit drivers are “on your conscience” because the agency has taken so long to act.
“I think if your agency had a safety mission and a safety mind-set it wouldn’t have taken you eight years,” Oberstar told McMurray at a hearing, demanding that she “carry back to your agency” his message to “get people moving.”
He said the agency’s efforts to fulfill the eight recommendations made by the National Transportation Safety Board “have been begrudging and painstakingly slow. … The progress has been just about negligible.”
McMurray said the agency has proposed one rule and is close to proposing another to address two of the recommendations — to merge the licensing and medical certification of commercial drivers, and to create a national registry of examiners approved to issue medical certificates — and has made progress on two other recommendations. However, she said it will be about three years before progress is evident on the remaining four recommendations.
“We have to make sure we do this right and we have to ensure there are not unintended consequences,” McMurray said.
The NTSB made the recommendations in response to a 1999 motorcoach accident in New Orleans that killed 22, and put them on the agency’s “most wanted” list in 2003.
In the New Orleans motorcoach accident, the NTSB said the bus driver, Frank Bedell, 46, suffered life-threatening kidney and heart conditions but held a valid license and medical certificate. A passenger recounted seeing the driver slumped in his seat moments before the crash.
Tractor-trailer and bus drivers have suffered seizures, heart attacks or unconscious spells while behind the wheel. Such illnesses have been a critical factor in thousands of serious truck accidents.
The NTSB recommended that examiners who certify drivers as medically fit be qualified and know what to look for, and that a system be set up to track medical certificate applications and prevent drivers from doctor shopping.
A study by the House committee found that it’s so easy to fabricate the medical certificates required to operate commercial trucks and buses that there’s almost no incentive for drivers to obtain a legitimate document.
There are so few controls over how drivers obtain medical certificates that it’s “relatively easy for a motivated commercial driver to circumvent the physical examination requirement,” the study found. Nor is there any database or central repository which would allow state inspectors to verify the legitimacy of a medical certificate.
“Because so few attempts are made to authenticate a certificate, there is little risk that a driver will be caught if he or she forges or adulterates a certificate,” the study said.
The study was based on a sample of 614 medical certificates obtained from truck drivers at roadside inspections in California, Illinois and Ohio. The committee’s staff attempted to contact the examiners named on the medical certificates but could only verify 407 as valid.
One Ohio doctor contacted by the committee said forgery of medical certificates is so commonplace “no one gets alarmed by it anymore.”
Hundreds of thousands of drivers carry commercial licenses even though they also qualify for full federal disability payments, according to a U.S. safety study disclosed by The Associated Press earlier this week.
The Government Accountability Office said in the study that 563,000 commercial drivers were determined by the Veterans Affairs Department, Labor Department or Social Security Administration to also be eligible for full disability benefits over health issues. It said disability doesn’t necessarily mean a driver is unfit to operate a commercial vehicle, but its investigators found alarming examples that raised doubts about the safety of the nation’s highways.
___
On the Net:
House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee: http://transportation.house.gov/
http://semi-accident.net
Copyright 2008 The Associated Press.
House committee probes medically unfit truckers
As we commented on earlier this week, the issue of the medical fitness of truck drivers has been in the news. In conjunction with that is the below story from the AP about hearings of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee. We will continue to monitor this story carefully, as the issue of the safety of our nation’s truck drivers is of the highest order.
Attorney Gordon Johnson,
http://semi-accident.com
http://tbilaw.com
https://waiting.com
http://vestibulardisorder.com
http://youtube.com/profile?user=braininjuryattorney
g@gordonjohnson.com
800-992-9447
©Attorney Gordon S. Johnson, Jr. 2008
Date: 07/24/2008 03:24 AM
By JOAN LOWY
Associated Press Writer
WASHINGTON (AP) _ It’s so easy to fabricate the medical certificates required to operate commercial trucks on the nation’s highways that there’s almost no incentive for truckers to obtain a legitimate document, according to a congressional study.
The House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee’s study — expected to be released at a hearing Thursday — found that there are so few controls over how drivers obtain medical certificates that it’s “relatively easy for a motivated commercial driver to circumvent the physical examination requirement.” Nor is there any database or central repository which would allow state inspectors to verify the legitimacy of a medical certificate.
“Because so few attempts are made to authenticate a certificate, there is little risk that a driver will be caught if he or she forges or adulterates a certificate,” according to the report, which was obtained by The Associated Press.
The Transportation Committee’s study was based on a sample of 614 medical certificates obtained from truck drivers at roadside inspections in California, Illinois and Ohio. The committee’s staff attempted to contact the medical examiners named on the certificates but could only verify 407 as valid.
One Ohio doctor contacted by the committee said forgery of medical certificates is so commonplace “no one gets alarmed by it anymore.”
The committee called officials of the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration to explain at the hearing why the agency hasn’t fully implemented recommendations made nearly seven years ago on how to keep medically unfit truck drivers off the road. The witness list also included officials from the National Transportation Safety Board, which made the recommendations.
The NTSB made the recommendations in September 2001 in response to a 1999 motorcoach accident in New Orleans that killed 22. They have lingered on the NTSB’s “most wanted” list of safety improvements for five years.
In the New Orleans motorcoach accident, the NTSB said the bus driver, Frank Bedell, 46, suffered life-threatening kidney and heart conditions but held a valid license and medical certificate. A passenger recounted seeing the driver slumped in his seat moments before the crash.
Bedell died three months later of an apparent heart-related illness. Investigators said he was treated at least 20 times in the 21 months before the accident for various ailments.
Tractor-trailer and bus drivers have suffered seizures, heart attacks or unconscious spells while behind the wheel. Such illnesses have been a critical factor in thousands of serious truck accidents.
The NTSB recommended that examiners who certify drivers as medically fit be qualified and know what to look for, that a system be set up to track medical certificate applications and prevent drivers from doctor shopping, and that a mechanism be provided for reporting drivers with potentially debilitating medical conditions.
Hundreds of thousands of drivers carry commercial licenses even though they also qualify for full federal disability payments, according to a new U.S. safety study disclosed by The Associated Press earlier this week.
The Government Accountability Office said in the study that 563,000 commercial drivers were determined by the Veterans Affairs Department, Labor Department or Social Security Administration to also be eligible for full disability benefits over health issues. It said disability doesn’t necessarily mean a driver is unfit to operate a commercial vehicle, but its investigators found alarming examples that raised doubts about the safety of the nation’s highways. They identified more than 1,000 drivers with vision, hearing or seizure disorders, which generally would prohibit a trucker from obtaining a valid commercial license.
Truckers violating federal medical rules have been caught in every state, according to an AP review of 7.3 million commercial driver violations compiled by the Transportation Department in 2006, the latest data available. Texas, Maryland, Georgia, Florida, Indiana, Pennsylvania, Illinois, Michigan, Alabama, New Jersey, Minnesota and Ohio were states where drivers were sanctioned most frequently for breaking medical rules, such as failing to carry a valid medical certificate. Those 12 states accounted for half of all such violations in the United States.
Copyright 2008 The Associated Press.
Attorney Gordon Johnson,
http://semi-accident.com
http://tbilaw.com
https://waiting.com
http://vestibulardisorder.com
http://youtube.com/profile?user=braininjuryattorney
g@gordonjohnson.com
800-992-9447
©Attorney Gordon S. Johnson, Jr. 2008
Date: 07/24/2008 03:24 AM
By JOAN LOWY
Associated Press Writer
WASHINGTON (AP) _ It’s so easy to fabricate the medical certificates required to operate commercial trucks on the nation’s highways that there’s almost no incentive for truckers to obtain a legitimate document, according to a congressional study.
The House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee’s study — expected to be released at a hearing Thursday — found that there are so few controls over how drivers obtain medical certificates that it’s “relatively easy for a motivated commercial driver to circumvent the physical examination requirement.” Nor is there any database or central repository which would allow state inspectors to verify the legitimacy of a medical certificate.
“Because so few attempts are made to authenticate a certificate, there is little risk that a driver will be caught if he or she forges or adulterates a certificate,” according to the report, which was obtained by The Associated Press.
The Transportation Committee’s study was based on a sample of 614 medical certificates obtained from truck drivers at roadside inspections in California, Illinois and Ohio. The committee’s staff attempted to contact the medical examiners named on the certificates but could only verify 407 as valid.
One Ohio doctor contacted by the committee said forgery of medical certificates is so commonplace “no one gets alarmed by it anymore.”
The committee called officials of the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration to explain at the hearing why the agency hasn’t fully implemented recommendations made nearly seven years ago on how to keep medically unfit truck drivers off the road. The witness list also included officials from the National Transportation Safety Board, which made the recommendations.
The NTSB made the recommendations in September 2001 in response to a 1999 motorcoach accident in New Orleans that killed 22. They have lingered on the NTSB’s “most wanted” list of safety improvements for five years.
In the New Orleans motorcoach accident, the NTSB said the bus driver, Frank Bedell, 46, suffered life-threatening kidney and heart conditions but held a valid license and medical certificate. A passenger recounted seeing the driver slumped in his seat moments before the crash.
Bedell died three months later of an apparent heart-related illness. Investigators said he was treated at least 20 times in the 21 months before the accident for various ailments.
Tractor-trailer and bus drivers have suffered seizures, heart attacks or unconscious spells while behind the wheel. Such illnesses have been a critical factor in thousands of serious truck accidents.
The NTSB recommended that examiners who certify drivers as medically fit be qualified and know what to look for, that a system be set up to track medical certificate applications and prevent drivers from doctor shopping, and that a mechanism be provided for reporting drivers with potentially debilitating medical conditions.
Hundreds of thousands of drivers carry commercial licenses even though they also qualify for full federal disability payments, according to a new U.S. safety study disclosed by The Associated Press earlier this week.
The Government Accountability Office said in the study that 563,000 commercial drivers were determined by the Veterans Affairs Department, Labor Department or Social Security Administration to also be eligible for full disability benefits over health issues. It said disability doesn’t necessarily mean a driver is unfit to operate a commercial vehicle, but its investigators found alarming examples that raised doubts about the safety of the nation’s highways. They identified more than 1,000 drivers with vision, hearing or seizure disorders, which generally would prohibit a trucker from obtaining a valid commercial license.
Truckers violating federal medical rules have been caught in every state, according to an AP review of 7.3 million commercial driver violations compiled by the Transportation Department in 2006, the latest data available. Texas, Maryland, Georgia, Florida, Indiana, Pennsylvania, Illinois, Michigan, Alabama, New Jersey, Minnesota and Ohio were states where drivers were sanctioned most frequently for breaking medical rules, such as failing to carry a valid medical certificate. Those 12 states accounted for half of all such violations in the United States.
Copyright 2008 The Associated Press.