A concerned motorist in Florida recently made headlines when she gave a law enforcement officer a warning for speeding. Even before this story became news, however, investigators at the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) identified recommendations to improve police officers’ road safety after surveying officers in one state.

Although motor vehicle crashes are the leading cause of work-related death among officers across the country, few studies have examined how these officers feel about their own safety on the road. To find out, in 2011 investigators surveyed nearly 1,500 officers in the state of Iowa, where NIOSH already had established relationships with several law enforcement agencies. Sixty randomly selected Iowa agencies voluntarily participated in the survey.