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What role does rest play in your work life?

By Shun McGhee, Guest Contributor

Most of us have at some time heard the old adage; “Early to bed early to rise makes a man healthy wealthy and wise.” The question is, how true is this statement? In exploring this question I encountered some interesting statistics. “Although it is difficult to estimate the extent that sleep deprivation plays in medical errors, studies have shown a significant impact. For example, a 2004 study led by Dr. Charles Czeisler of the Division of Sleep Medicine at Harvard Medical School found that hospitals could reduce the number of medical errors by as much as 36 percent by limiting an individual doctor’s work shifts to 16 hours and reducing the total work schedule to no more than 80 hours per week.”  Additional studies indicate commercial truck drivers are responsible for nearly 10 percent of the fatal accidents on public highways in California, and sleep deprivation is the root cause of almost 40 percent of all related truck accidents in the US. While the majority of the workforce may not be faced with such dangerous workplace environments, all of our jobs are important. That said, I believe, and studies support, that most employees would benefit from incorporating more sleep into their daily lives to increase alertness while on the job. There are several ways to schedule more sleep, a few of which I have included below.

1)      The most obvious is, go to bed earlier.

2)      Schedule naps during the day. You may not have a place on the worksite where you can nap but if you have a car perhaps you can go there and catch a nap during work breaks.

3)      Work out prior to going to bed. This could cause you to be more tired and hopefully maximize your rest.

These are not the only means of getting more rest. Feel free to conduct your own research to find rest-inducing alternatives. You may want to consult coworkers, family members, and even a family doctor find ways to get more sleep. Let me know what you find, as we all could benefit from more sleep!

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