Abstract
Sedative side effects of antihistamines have been recognized to be potentially dangerous in car driving, but the mechanism underlying these effects has not yet been elucidated. The aim of the present study is to examine regional cerebral blood flow (rCBF) responses during a simulated cardriving task following oral administration of dchlorpheniramine using positron emission tomography (PET) and [15O]H2O. Healthy volunteers drove a car in a simulated environment following oral administration of a sedative antihistamine, d-chlorpheniramine, or placebo. Their rCBF was measured in the conditions of resting, active driving, and passive driving. Performance evaluation revealed that the number of lane deviations significantly increased in the dchlorpheniramine condition (p<0.01). Subjective sleepiness was not significantly different between the two drug conditions. The regions of diminished brain responses were detected following d-chlorpheniramine treatment in the parietal, temporal and visual cortices and in the cerebellum. These results suggest that d-chlorpheniramine tends to suppress visuo-spatial cognition and visuo-motor coordination even when the subjects do not recognize subjective feeling of sedation.
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© 2009 International Federation of Medical and Biological Engineering
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Tashiro, M. et al. (2009). Regional Brain Activity and Performance During Car-Driving Under Side Effects of Psychoactive Drugs. In: Lim, C.T., Goh, J.C.H. (eds) 13th International Conference on Biomedical Engineering. IFMBE Proceedings, vol 23. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-540-92841-6_551
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-540-92841-6_551
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