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Car accident hypo

R

rgjard25

Newbie
Messages
3
Hi

I had a car accident last week due to having a sudden onset hypo with no warning! This has never happened before and am so distraught about it all. I always check my bloods, have good control, warnings of hypos and never drive if below 6. I have seen my doctor etc and he told me that I have to tell DVLA and that I will probably lose my licence for a year. The police at the scene told me it would not affect my licence. Has anyone else had anything similar happen to them and if so what did you do? I would be very grateful of some help and advice before I contact DVLA :(

Ruthie
x
 
Hi

what a horrid experience for you. I am a newbie and haven't had many hypos yet but thought that it might be worth looking in the DVLA site. I am guessing that they will need a new questionnaire from you.
Hope it all works out
x
 
sorry would like to add that it might be an idea to call diabetes Uk and see what they say.
 
Hi Ruthie and welcome to the forum.
Sorry to be the bearer of bad news but I'm afraid your GP is probably right. Every driver who is on insulin must advise both DVLA and their insurance company. When you inform them there is a form DIAB1 that you will need to complete and send to DVLA along with your driving licence. DVLA will use the information that you provide to assess your suitability to hold a driving licence. In most cases the licence is returned to you within 15 days. Questions 5 to 8 of the form cover hypos specifically and, as you have had an accident as a result of a hypo, it is possible they will consider your condition to be unsafe. You can't even get away with simply not mentioning the accident, because DVLA will check your answers with your GP, and he could be prosecuted and struck off if he covered up for you.
 
If this is a one off you should be ok. The dvla will ask for a medical report from your GP and if that was to say you have frequent hypos and have lost all warning signs you will lose your license. But for a one off incident you should be fine. I would believe the police over your or my GP any time as the police deal with this sort of thing day in day out.
You can always call the dvla and make an anonymous enquiry about the subject.

I lost hypo awareness a while back, do still get warnings signs sometimes, but didnt want to put anyone in danger. I stopped driving and just didn't renew my licence. But I don't have any need for a car.
 
sorry to hear that it happened since it sounds like you did everything right, i know there are so many people that don't test before driving.
it it were me I'm not sure I'd want to keep driving, because if it were to happen again the consquences could be horrific.
will be interested to hear how you get on
 
Hi

I'm really sorry to hear of your hypo problem while driving a car.

I was involved in a really bad car accident many years ago and wrote two cars off. At the time I had just started using "human type" insulin and had very little hypo awareness. Luckily, although the cars were injured no one else was.

I escaped losing my licence by asking to be transferred back to using animal insulin again which my consultant agreed to and my GP wrote a really nice letter on my behalf saying that my diabetes was normally well controlled and that my hypo awareness should not be a problem using animal insulin. With that, I was able to hold on to my licence and also my career.

Whenever I get behind the wheel of a car now I always make sure that I have some glucose tabs and sweets ready to eat in case I dont feel ok. Pulling over to the left when not well is easier said than done especially on busy main roads with loads of traffic. Hypos have this dreadful habit of catching people out and they always come when you dont want them to.

I will send you a PM because there's some other stuff that you need to know regarding the police.
 
sofaraway said:
sorry to hear that it happened since it sounds like you did everything right, i know there are so many people that don't test before driving.
it it were me I'm not sure I'd want to keep driving, because if it were to happen again the consquences could be horrific.
will be interested to hear how you get on
Click to expand...

I think I agree with this, with the added proviso - assuming I could not account for the sudden drop. If the hypo came without warning, and I had no idea why, then I would have absolutely no way of guaranteeing that it wouldn't happen again, so I would be very scared that one day I might kill myself or someone else.

On the other hand, if it were a unique set of circumstances, which explained the sudden hypo, and which I could make sure wouldn't ever happen again, then I might just resolve to be more careful in future and wait to get my license back.
 
Thanks everyone for your replies. I will contact DVLA and post a message letting you know the outcome. Fingers crossed.

Ruthie
x
 
l0vaduck said:
sofaraway said:
I think I agree with this, with the added proviso - assuming I could not account for the sudden drop. If the hypo came without warning, and I had no idea why, then I would have absolutely no way of guaranteeing that it wouldn't happen again, so I would be very scared that one day I might kill myself or someone else.
Click to expand...
Click to expand...

That's just called "going out in style".
 
Hi

Just to let you know that have been told NOT to drive, my licence and medical report forms are away to DVLA. Just waiting to see how long they are keeping my licence off me.

Ruthie
x
 
Sorry about your news but i belive there will be a lot more of this with NICE saying we can only test twice a week if at all.
 
Graham55 said:
Sorry about your news but i belive there will be a lot more of this with NICE saying we can only test twice a week if at all.
Click to expand...

***?


Driving and insulin is a bad combination really. No matter how well "controlled" you are a hypo can hit any of us in the blink of an eye for no reason.
 
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