Reduce the stress of shift work – Sleep guide for shift workers

One in four Finnish employees do shift work, and the number is growing. Shift work refers to any work that deviates from a regular nine-to-five day job. It can be two-shift work, three-shift work or night-shift work.

Shift work makes life more flexible for many people and makes it easier to schedule their day. Many consider evening or night shifts as sensible and have no trouble working them as long as recovery is taken care of.

At the same time, shift work stresses the body’s circadian rhythm. Humans are physiologically designed to sleep at night and be awake during the day. When the sleep pattern goes against the natural rhythm, sleep is often shorter and its quality deteriorates. This makes people susceptible for weaker attention, slower decision-making and accidents, particularly during night shifts.

In Finland, 17 per cent of men and 12 per cent of women work night shifts often or all the time. The risk of accidents or injuries is approximately 1.4 times higher than in day shifts.

Adaptation to shift work is individual. It is impacted by things like the person’s natural circadian rhythm (an early bird or a night owl) and the planning of the shifts. The stress may grow with age, which makes recovery even more important.

From the employer’s point of view, the stress of shift work must be managed systematically, and employees must be offered tools for recovery.

Tool for employers: a sleep guide for shift workers you can distribute to your employees

Pihlajalinna’s sleep guide for shift workers has tips for sleep, recovery and coping. You can distribute it as part of internal communications or occupational well-being.

Download the guide as PDF

Do you want to support your employees’ recovery and work ability?

Pihlajalinna Occupational Health offers comprehensive solutions for identifying and treating challenges related to sleep and recovery. The services support both individual coping and the organisation’s working capacity management:

• Sleep training is a treatment for insomnia provided according to the Finnish Current Care Guidelines. It is an excellent option for shift workers.

• Polysomnography enables quick diagnoses without a referral, as part of the occupational health agreement.

• Initiation of CPAP treatment for sleep apnoea makes it quicker to start treatment.

Please contact your occupational health team for more information.