Many older drivers face the difficult decision about when to hang up their car keys for good. Often, it’s a choice between safety and independence. As the population ages and the number of older drivers surges, that choice is becoming more and more critical to highway safety around the country and right here in Virginia.

Many times, families go it alone when it comes time to talk to older loved ones about retiring from the road. But new evidence suggests doctors could have more of an impact on the decision. According to a recent report in the New England Journal of Medicine, when doctors warned older patients they may be unfit to drive, there was a drop in serious crash injuries among those drivers—though it wasn’t clear whether the drop was due to driving less or driving more carefully.

In lieu of a doctor’s recommendation, how can you help gauge whether you or a loved one should still be behind the wheel? The American Medical Association recommends these simple tests:

1. Walk 10 feet down the hallway, turn around and come back. Taking longer than 9 seconds is linked to driving problems.
2. On a page with the letters A to L and the numbers 1 to 13 randomly arranged, see how quickly and accurately you draw a line from 1 to A, then to 2, then to B and so on. This so-called trail-making test measures memory, spatial processing, and other brain skills, and doing poorly has been linked to at-fault crashes.
3. Check if people can turn their necks far enough to change lanes, and have the strength to slam on brakes.