For most of my adult life, I have worked in shift work, whether it be in retail management, law enforcement, shelter work, or crisis line work. I’ve most likely worked every possible combination for first, second, and third shifts spanning eight, ten, and twelve hours. My career has mostly consisted of working the second shift. Shift work presents a variety of difficulties, including loneliness and fatigue.
Approximately 25% of US employees engage in shift work. Lack of sleep can put workers in many of these professions at risk for safety issues. How are you expected to react and make a split-second decision when your judgment is clouded by fatigue? Studies show that response times are reduced by 50% after 17-19 hours without sleep. This amount of time without sleep also results in the equivalent of a BAC of .05. Driving while drowsy results in over 9% of all crashes and 21% of all traffic fatalities. Another study shows that driving with fewer than five hours of sleep is equivalent to drunk driving.
I share these statistics to show that this is more than my opinion. This is dangerous. However, we expect police, fire, EMS, doctors, and nurses to work extended hours without sleep and make life-or-death decisions. I recall many times being required to work 8 hours of mandatory overtime backing up to my actual shift. I can assure you I was more irritable and less capable of making the same decisions I could have made with adequate sleep. We have police officers driving “under the influence” while trying to remove those under the influence from the streets.
This is not only impairing our physical faculties but also affecting our mental health. According to Brown et al., shift workers have higher rates of depression, anxiety, substance use, reduced quality of life, and suicidal ideation. Night shift workers have a 40% increased risk of depression. According to certain studies, women are more negatively impacted by shift work than men are by sleep, fatigue, and other aspects of their well-being.