Extended work shifts and the risk of motor vehicle crashes among interns.
Landrigan CP, Rothschild JM, Cronin JW, Kaushal R, Burdick E, Katz T et al. Effect of eliminating extended work shifts and reducing work hours on serious medical errors among interns in ICUs.
Barger LK, Cade BE, Ayas NT, Cronin JW, Rosner B, Speizer FE, Czeisler CA. Extended work shifts and the risk of motor vehicle crashes among interns.
Does eliminating extended work shifts and reducing the number of hours worked per week reduce serious medical errors made in intensive care units by interns?
Not only sleepiness and circadian phase, but also age and gender are major factors that may contribute to attentional failures in extended work shifts and during nighttime work shifts.
The extended work shifts (7 30 am-7 30 am-7 30uced the workload to less than 49% between 4 pm and 8 am; thus, allowing the combination of an eight-houreducedng day withea 16-hour on-call duty, a schedule that complied workloadW stondards and effectivelessvoided a shifthanodel.
Require the lab staff to follow up extended work shifts with periods of quarantine before they head home to families, friends and neighbors.
Extended work shifts and overtime for nurses have also escalated; however, nurses report making more errors when working shifts >12 hours, working overtime, or working >40 hours per week (9 ).
Even after these regulations were enacted, studies have showed that extended work shifts were associated with increased risk of automobile accidents [ 3] and percutaneous needle-stick injuries [ 4] among residents.
Fatigue arising from extended work shifts and shift work have been implicated as impacting both physical and psychological disorders, ranging from an increased risk of motor vehicle crashes [ 9, 10], depression [ 11], and heart disease [ 12], to drug and alcohol abuse [ 13- 15].
