Category: Sleep

Working Hours and Fatigue: Meeting the Needs of American Workers and Employers

In November 2022, the American Journal of Industrial Medicine (AJIM) published a special issue focusing on work-related fatigue. The issue explores factors that may increase work-related fatigue and actions to reduce work-related injuries and illnesses. [1] This issue is a result of discussions and collaborations from the 2019 NIOSH Working Hours, Sleep and Fatigue Forum Read More >

Posted on by Grace Vixama, MPH; Imelda Wong, PhD; and Naomi Swanson, PhD1 Comment

Here Comes the Sun! Tips to Adapt to Daylight Saving Time

Daylight Saving Time (DST) marks the time to “spring” ahead one hour for most of the United States. Where it is observed, Daylight Saving Time begins this year on Sunday, March 13, 2022. This transition from Standard Time was first enacted to conserve energy and shift the timing of our activities to match more daylight Read More >

Posted on by Imelda Wong, PhD, and Beverly Hittle, PhD, RN8 Comments

Lighting Interventions to Reduce Circadian Disruption in Rotating Shift Workers

  Shift work has been linked to poor sleep, chronic metabolic disorders (e.g., cardiovascular disease, diabetes, and obesity), several forms of cancer [1-3], depression, and elevated risk for the occurrence of accidents. These risks are especially acute for those who work rotating shifts that involve working through the night [4-8], as sometimes occur in hospitals. Read More >

Posted on by Mariana G. Figueiro, PhD, and David PedlerLeave a comment

Working from Home: How to Optimize Your Work Environment and Stay Healthy

  Many workers continue to telework during the pandemic. While some may be fortunate to have a designated home office, others are competing for workspace with family members. A makeshift desk at the kitchen table or a temporary bedroom office are common. These new work arrangements combined with the additional stressors of working at home Read More >

Posted on by Brian D. Lowe, PhD, CPE; Jeannie A.S. Nigam, MS; Claire Caruso, PhD, RN, FAAN; Imelda Wong, PhD; and Julie Tisdale-Pardi, MA13 Comments

Improve Sleep: Tips to Improve Your Sleep When Times Are Tough

  Just like food or water, sleep is a biological necessity for life and health. Research shows that the hours we spend sleeping are incredibly important and far from passive. During sleep, your body is busy fighting off viruses and other pathogens, operating a waste removal system to clean the brain, looking for cancer cells Read More >

Posted on by Claire C Caruso PhD, RN, FAAN, and L. Casey Chosewood, MD, MPH23 Comments

NIOSH Working Hours, Sleep and Fatigue Forum: A Recap and Future Directions

The National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH), has had a longstanding interest in nonstandard work hours and associated health and safety effects. The last NIOSH meeting on this topic was held in 2004 and centered around long working hours and the impact on injuries, illnesses, and health behaviors. To build on this expertise, Read More >

Posted on by Imelda Wong, PhD, and Naomi Swanson, PhD11 Comments

NIOSH Presents: Research on Managing Fatigue in the Workplace, Lessons Learned

On March 20-23, 2017, thirteen participants from the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) attended the 10th International Conference on Managing Fatigue, in San Diego, California. This year’s conference was the first held in the U.S. since 2009, and was attended by over 260 Read More >

Posted on by Sarah Mitchell, MPH6 Comments

National Police Week and NIOSH’s Work in Officer Safety

Peace Officers Memorial Day and National Police Week are observances that pay tribute to local, state, and Federal officers who have died or been disabled in the line of duty.  The Peace Officers Memorial Day occurs annually on May 15 which was designated by President John F. Kennedy in 1962.  National Police Week is the Read More >

Posted on by Hope M. Tiesman, PhD; Jeff Rojek, PhD; Hongwei Hsiao, PhD; Claire Caruso, PhD3 Comments

Short Sleep Duration by Occupation Group

March is Sleep Awareness Month.  The American Academy of Sleep Medicine and the Sleep Research Society determined that adults require at least 7 hours of sleep per day to promote optimal health. Short sleep duration (< 7 hours per day) has been linked to various negative health outcomes including cardiovascular disease, obesity, and depression, as Read More >

Posted on by Taylor Shockey, MPH5 Comments

New NIOSH Training Offers Fatigue Management for Pilots in the Land of the Midnight Sun

  For a pilot working in Western Alaska, the amount of daylight during their work day can vary as much as 14 hours between the summer and winter solstice (or more the farther north you go). These aviators often fly multiple legs each day, serving as a transportation link to over 250 villages across the Read More >

Posted on by CAPT Mary O’Connor, MS, REHS3 Comments

Shift Work and Sleep

In today’s competitive economy, an increasing number of U.S. businesses operate to meet customer demand for 24/7 services. These around-the-clock operations are required in order to maintain a place in the global market where transactions with clients, suppliers, and colleagues can span multiple time zones.  Consequently, for many men and women, the workday no longer Read More >

Posted on by Geoffrey Calvert, MD, MPH, FACP11 Comments

Daylight Saving: Suggestions to help workers adapt to the time change

  Spring forward Fall back. We all know the saying to help us remember to adjust our clocks for the daylight saving time changes (this Sunday in case you are wondering). But, what can we do to help workers adjust to the effects of the time change?  A few studies have examined these issues but Read More >

Posted on by Claire Caruso, PhD, RN, FAAN15 Comments

A Hard Day’s Night: Training Provides Nurses with Strategies for Shift Work and Long Work Hours

“The problem for me became very severe and my head nurse actually called me into her office to discuss it… it had gotten to the point where I was so chronically sleep-deprived that I was falling asleep while I was trying to report off to the on-coming shift. So, I’m sitting there talking about very Read More >

Posted on by Claire Caruso, PhD, RN, FAAN6 Comments

Work-family Conflict, Sleep, and the Heart

  Health care workers represent an increasingly important and ever growing work force in our society. They are also a group of “high-risk workers” meaning they report a lot of musculoskeletal pain, work-related injuries and sleep deficiencies. In addition to this, many health care workers labor in rotating shifts, with little time in-between shifts, so Read More >

Posted on by Orfeu M. Buxton, PhD and Henrik Jacobsen, PhD 7 Comments

Sleep, Pain, and Hospital Workers

We know that decreased sleep duration and extended shifts in healthcare workers are linked to workplace injuries.  The effects of decreased sleep on pain in the workplace are less clear.  New research from the Harvard Center for Work, Health and Wellbeing  –one of four NIOSH Centers of Excellence funded to explore and research the concepts Read More >

Posted on by Orfeu M. Buxton, PhD; Glorian Sorensen, PhD, MPH 16 Comments

NIOSH Research on Work Schedules and Work-related Sleep Loss

Yesterday, in honor of National Sleep Awareness Week, we blogged about sleep and work and the risks to workers, employers, and the public when workers’ hours and shifts do not allow for adequate sleep.   This blog provides a brief overview of some of the work that NIOSH intramural scientists are carrying out to better understand Read More >

Posted on by Claire Caruso, PhD, RN; Luenda Charles, PhD; Tina Lawson, PhD; Akinori Nakata, PhD; Karl Sieber, PhD; Sudha Pandalai, MD, PhD; and Ted Hitchcock, PhD28 Comments

Sleep and Work

Sleep is a vital biological function and many Americans don’t get enough. To coincide with National Sleep Awareness Week, the new NIOSH blog post: Sleep and Work summarizes the risks to workers, employers and the public when long hours and irregular shifts required by many jobs do not allow workers to get adequate sleep. Read More >

Posted on by Claire Caruso, PhD, RN, and Roger R Rosa, PhD78 Comments