Legal aspects of motor traffic trauma in Sri Lanka

Study on Evaluation of Knowledge, Attitude, and Practice of Sri Lankan Traffic Police Officers Related to Examination of Drunk Drivers, in Two Most Populated Districts of Sri Lanka

Introduction:

Driving under the influence (DUI) of alcohol is one of the substantial predisposing factors for mishaps among road users. A traffic police officer will be the first authoritative personnel a drunk driver encounters in the legal system. The absence of accurate skills and knowledge of these officers impedes the structuring of legal procedures and may lead to miscarriage of justice.

Objective:

To assess the knowledge, attitude and practice of Sri Lankan traffic police in handling and managing an alleged case of driving under influence of alcohol.

Methods:

This was a descriptive cross sectional study carried on a sample of 384 traffic police officers attached to the districts of Colombo and Gampaha, through a questionnaire.

Results:

Out of 384, only 75 of police officers knew the correct preliminaries to perform before administering a breathalyzer test. 79.7% knew the correct instructions for using a breathalyzer, but only 3.4% knew the colour changes of the breathalyzer. Significantly poor attitude was observed among the police officers, regarding the importance of producing a drunk driver for medico-legal examination ( P = 0.001) Only 222 (57.8%) answered correctly that a drunk driver needs to be subjected to a medico-legal examination as early as possible. Significantly poor practice and attitude was observed in officers with longer service duration but no significant association was observed between ranks of officers and attitude and practice ( P = 0.199).

Conclusions:

The results of our study demonstrate that the knowledge attitude and practice on efficiently handling a case of DUI among traffic police officers is poor, even though all of them are engaged in DUI duties irrespective of their service duration. The need for continuous professional development programmes was highlighted.