nurse sitting at laptop looking annoyed
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Not getting enough sleep and working night shifts can increase the risk of infections among nurses, according to a new study.
The report was published Monday in Chronobiology International. Researchers evaluated data that was self-reported from 1,335 nurses in Norway. The nurses were part of the Survey of Shift work, Sleep and Health (SUSSH) study, which was collected in 2018. Of the nurses, 90.4% were women and they were about 42 years old on average. The nurses shared details on how long they slept, when their shifts were and the occurrence of infections over the three-month span leading up to the survey.
Shift work, especially working nights, was linked to a higher risk of several infections, including the common cold, the data showed.
Sleep debt is defined as the gap between how much sleep people need and how much they actually receive. Nurses with moderate sleep debt (between 1 and 120 minutes less than they needed) had a 33% higher risk of the common cold, while those with severe sleep debt (missing more than 2 hours) had more than double compared to those with no sleep debt.
Specifically, the risk of pneumonia or bronchitis was 129% higher among those with moderate sleep debt and 288% for those with severe sleep debt. The more sleep debt people had, they were also at a higher risk for sinusitis and gastrointestinal infections, the data showed.
Though working at night was linked to a heightened risk for the common cold, it wasn’t associated with the other infections that the researchers evaluated. How long nurses slept, and how short a time they had between shifts wasn’t linked with infection risk, either.
The research was conducted in the spring, so levels of infection may be higher if the data was collected from the fall or winter, the authors pointed out.
“These findings highlight the need for tailored interventions to reduce infection risks among healthcare workers,” Siri Waage, senior author of the study from the Norwegian Competence Center for Sleep Disorders at Haukeland University Hospital, said in a statement.
“Sleep debt and irregular shift patterns, including night work, not only compromise nurses’ immune health but could also impact their ability to provide high-quality patient care,” Waage added.