Experience and limited lighting may affect sleepiness of tunnel workers

BMC Research Notes

Kostas Spiropoulos¹  Athanasios Tsakalidis²  Evanthia Faliagka²  Magdalini-Konstantina Tranou¹  Fotis Sampsonas¹  John Lakoumentas²  Dimitrios Patouchas¹  Kiriakos Karkoulias¹  Dimosthenis Lykouras¹ 

[1] Department of Pulmonary Medicine, University of Patras, University Hospital of Patras, Rio, Patras 26500, Greece;Department of Computer Engineering and Informatics, University of Patras, Patras 26500, Greece

关键词: Tunnel workers;    Construction;    Shift work;    Sleepiness;    Respiratory;   

Others  :  1132349
DOI  :  10.1186/1756-0500-7-417

 received in 2013-10-12, accepted in 2014-06-23,  发布年份 2014

【 摘 要 】

Background

Working on shifts, especially on a night shift, influences the endogenous sleep regulation system leading to diminished sleep time and increased somnolence. We attempted to evaluate the impact of shifts on sleepiness and correlate the sleepiness score to the experience in a shift schedule.

Materials and methods

This cross-sectional study consists of 42 male and 2 female workers involved in a tunnel construction. They underwent spirometry, pulse oximetry and were asked to complete the Epworth Sleepiness Scale questionnaire.

Results

Statistical analysis revealed that workers of lower Epworth had a mean age of 43.6 years, compared to the mean age of 36.4 years of workers with higher Epworth. Furthermore, workers of lower Epworth were characterized by a mean number of shift years equal to 14.8, while those of higher Epworth possessed a mean number of shift years equal to 8. The shift schedule did not reveal any statistically significant correlation.

Conclusions

Workers employed for a longer time had diminished sleepiness. However, there is no relationship between night shifts and sleepiness, possibly because of exposure to artificial lighting in the construction site.

【 授权许可】

   
2014 Lykouras et al.; licensee BioMed Central Ltd.

【 图 表 】

Figure 1.

Figure 2.

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