Safety Considerations Related to 12-Hour Shift Schedules

Accidents are 27 percent more likely to occur on 12-hour shift schedules according to Simon Folkard, a university professor, specialist in health and safety risk, and developer of the "Fatigue and Risk Index Calculator" for the "Health and Safety Executive." Longer shifts lead to fatigue and may also cause chronic health conditions.

Safety

• Mental and physical fatigue results in mistakes, accidents and injuries on the job. An experiment conducted by Drew Dawson, the director of the Centre for Sleep Research at the University of South Australia, showed that excessive fatigue while driving a vehicle is as dangerous as driving under the influence of alcohol.

Health

• Compressed work week schedules have been shown to cause long-term health problems. In his 2000 doctoral thesis, Dr. Henrik Bøggild of the Department of Occupational Medicine at the Aalborg Regional Hospital in Denmark, specifically linked 12-hour shifts to increased rates of heart disease. A 2006 study, published in the International Archives of Occupational and Environmental Health, linked irregular shift work to peptic ulcers and other gastrointestinal disorders. The health risks of 12-hour shifts stem from disturbance to the body´s natural circadian rhythms.

Considerations

• The National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health recommends that companies educate employees about the potential dangers of their shift schedule, provide nutritious food for refueling, eliminate overtime, and encourage napping on breaks as part of a strategy to promote a safer workplace.