Shift Work Tied to Disordered Sleeping

THURSDAY, Jan. 4, 2024 (HealthDay News) -- All shift work schedules are associated with adverse sleep effects, according to a study published online Dec. 7 in Frontiers in Psychiatry.

Gretha J. Boersma, Ph.D., from the GGZ Drenthe Mental Health Institute in Assen, Netherlands, and colleagues evaluated the presence of short sleep (no more than six hours) and long sleep (nine or more hours) as well as sleep disorders within a broad range of shift work schedules. The analysis included 37,662 working adults.

The researchers found that all sociodemographic factors examined affected the prevalence rates of short, long, and disordered sleep, consistent with previous studies. Compared with day workers, shift workers more frequently reported short sleep, most prominently night workers (26 versus 50 percent). Among shift workers, all sleep disorders (including insomnia, sleep-related breathing disorders, and sleep-related movement disorders) as well as sleep disorder comorbidity were more common, especially among night workers. Education level had the strongest associations with disturbed sleep among night shift workers, with a twofold higher prevalence of short and disordered sleep in those with low education achievement versus academic-educated groups.

"To prevent sleep curtailment and sleep disorders, employers/occupational health practitioners should encourage good sleep health and give tools to deal with shift work as well as possible, both promoting optimal sleep during the resting period and wakefulness during working hours," the authors write.

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