Human Factors Program to Lead Transit Bus Drug Study

The PPC has received a $414,000 grant through the Federal Transit Administration to develop and test new protocols for evaluating certain classes of prescription drugs for transit drivers. Daniel McGehee, Director of the Human Factors and Vehicle Safety Research program will lead an interdisciplinary team of UI researchers from medicine (Dr. Matt Rizzo ), pharmacy (Dr. Gary Milavetz), and engineering/NADS (Sue Ellen Salisbury, Omar Ahmad, Tim Brown) on the project. The study will develop and demonstrate a method for testing the behavioral impact of psychoactive substances on professional transit drivers. A transit bus simulator will be used for the testing at the National Advanced Driving Simulator Facility.