Focus on Fatigue

Yes, it is. When advising companies about their fatigue management policies we are often asked: what is the business incentive to ensure fatigue in the workforce is managed? Most people will appreciate the need to manage fatigue in order to ensure employee safety but what about the costs to an organization when an employee makes mistakes due to tiredness?

A good example of the costs incurred was shown in the 4 Corners documentary, Eyes Wide Shut, in which it was reported that economists estimate that insomnia and other sleep disorders cost the community over $10 billion a year. Read more about this in the Media Programme below.

Recent research in Australia provides evidence that thousands of dollars can be saved if steps are put in place to minimise fatigue in your employees.

The Centre for Sleep Research, University of South Australia, analysed the performance of train drivers and found that the more fatigued a train driver is the more fuel they use. The study showed that fatigued driving becomes less well-planned, resulting in reduced efficiency with increased fuel consumption along with heavier braking and more speed violations. The extra cost to the organisation was calculated at AU$3,512 per week simply by using highly fatigued drivers rather than low ones.

You can find more details about this research in our feature article, Train Driving Efficiency and Safety.

This research has real world consequences. Don't sit back and accept fatigue as a cost of doing business. Imagine how much staff health and morale could be improved and the money that can be made, by investing in a fatigue risk management plan.

Work safely,

Fiona Johnston
Shiftwork Services

Feature Article - Train Driving Efficiency and Safety: Examining the Cost of Fatigue

This is an example of savings that can be made when managing fatigue effectively. Sleep loss and fatigue are serious issues for train drivers, whose work hours are often long and uncertain and involve night and early morning shifts.

Studies collecting subjective reports and sleep measures have recorded periods of drowsiness and even microsleeps while driving. Rail accident reports in numerous countries, including Australia, China, Japan and the US have cited work-related fatigue.

Read the full article

Media Programme - Eyes Wide Open

Sleep deprivation is no trivial matter with economists estimating insomnia and other sleep disorders are costing the community over $10 billion a year.

And then there's the human cost. Drowsy driving is a factor in over 16 per cent of fatal road accidents and nine per cent of work accidents are attributed to sleep deprivation. Going too long without sleep diminishes your ability to function. It's like being drunk. In the long term, lack of sleep is a contributing factor for heart disease, depression and diabetes.

Eyes Wide Open programme guide

Research Corner - Managing Fatigue in Operational Settings: Reflecting on NASA’s Ideas After More Than a Decade

Sourced by Dr Adam Fletcher - Scientific Advisor to Faid^®Safe

For this issue we have decided to get back to basics and review a pair of fatigue management articles that were written by the NASA Fatigue Countermeasures Group over ten years ago. At first glance it might strike many of us that very little has changed - the physiology of humans has certainly not adapted, and we are still suffering from the same symptoms and other consequences of fatigue.

The 2 articles written by the NASA fatigue countermeasures group over 10 years ago, give us valuable reminders related to the critical importance of adequate sleep to prevent fatigue as well as details about common strategies including controlled napping, communication/supervision at work, use of caffeine (for those that choose to use it tactically), and the development of work patterns that consider circadian rhythms.

There are however, things that have changed since these thorough, practical articles were written. For example, one of the suggested future pharmacological countermeasures, melatonin, has generally not been supported by research as a useable therapeutic for the general population (although it can have significant benefits in particular populations such as those with circadian misalignment sleep disorders). Also, caffeine is no longer understood to be any more a diuretic than plain water (see Armstrong, 2002 for a detailed review), so there is one less reason to be cautioning people against its use. Finally, the idea of an integrated fatigue management system has matured beyond the suggested approach which addresses issues such as hours of work, training and education, and the application of countermeasures in a modular way with minimal inter-connection.

Faid^®Safe aims to address essential aspects of fatigue management in a more integrated way where information from one module (for example, Module 1: Hours of work diagnostic) actively informs other modules (such as Module 2: Fatigue hazard analysis, Module 5: Policies and procedures, and Module 9: Contingency and emergency plans). Nonetheless, there is a lot to be learned from looking at lessons from the past using articles such as these from NASA. We expect that you will be able to apply many of the suggestions as reminders or new ideas for you and your workforce.

The articles mentioned can be accessed via the following links:

Managing fatigue in operational settings I

Managing fatigue in operational settings II

Alliance Partner news

Shiftwork Services

Dr Kathy de Luc has joined Shiftwork Services, Kathy has extensive experience in management, organisational research and consultancy in both the private and public sectors in the United Kingdom and New Zealand. Her particular interest is in developing policies, procedures and research specific to the 24/7 workplace. Her aim is to provide practical, effective and simple answers for managers that can be translated into effective solutions.

Kathy has enabled Shiftwork Services to expand its range of services and is a member of the Australasian Sleep Association.

Shiftwork Services portfolio

InterDynamics

Adele Mitchell joined the InterDynamics team in October. Adele has an academic and educational background, plus over 20 years business experience, which combines well to support her professional focus of finding practical solutions for large and small businesses.

This new business development role will support General Manager Len Pearson in extending the Faid^®Safe services to reduce the risk of fatigue hazards in the workplace, in Australia, NZ, the Americas and Europe.

Adele is committed to lifelong learning and has been the plain language adviser on many corporate and public sector projects. In her current role, this is particularly useful when communicating with the technical specialists and range of management positions that are responsible for the Occupational Heath & Safety of organisations.

Clockwork Research relocation

Since forming in June 2005, Clockwork have gained a reputation as the European experts in the design and delivery of Fatigue Risk Management Systems (FRMS), having designed and implemented the easyJet Airline FRMS, widely recognised as an example of industry best practice. During this time the company has grown not only in size, but also in terms of the range and scope of projects undertaken, and a large proportion of the company's work is now in applied research.

The Clockwork Research team was recently strengthened by the addition of Principal Researcher, Dr Samira Bourgeois-Bougrine, an Associate Professor at Laboratoire d'Anthropologie Applicquée of the University of Paris, and Researcher, Cassie Hilditch, formerly of the Adelaide Institute for Sleep Health in South Australia. Clockwork have also moved to larger offices to enable them to continue to grow, whilst maintaining the quality of services that their clients have come to expect.

To assess fatigue risk in your organisation please contact one of the Faid^®Safe Alliance partners listed in the side bar.

Questions and Answers

Q. What is fatigue?

A working definition of fatigue is that it is a dynamic balance between two competing forces. The forces producing fatigue and forces reversing the effects of fatigue, that is, recovery due to sleep. The main causes of work related fatigue are long hours and working when you would usually be sleeping. Day time sleep is not as restorative as night time sleep. When assessing fatigue the time of day or night work needs to be accounted for as well as the number of hours sleep achieved.

Q. I would like to know, how is the fatigue calculated in FAID?

The Fatigue Audit InterDyne^® is a work-related fatigue model. To quantify the work-related fatigue, FAID^® analyses planned or actual set of work hours and also estimates the quality and times of sleep from the work periods. In the FAID^® Outputs the Sleep Propensity Plots display an estimate of a persons sleep using as inputs: the time of day the person finished the shift and length of break. The fatigue and sleep models are based on 3,500 days of sleep/wake and work data collected over a two-year period from 250 Australian shiftworkers.

Q. What should go into a fatigue management policy?

A fatigue management policy needs to address both personal and systemic aspects of safety and performance. It needs to include fatigue assessments, risk assessments, training, accident and incident investigation and contingency plans. Implementing an FRMP in a modular, isolated form i.e. doing the separate elements one at a time e.g. training, assessing planned hours of work, assessing actual hours of work is less effective than using an integrated approach where all elements are worked on together. This helps in making sure each element of the policy informs other elements in order to form a cohesive integrated package.

Working Globally

Faid^®Safe alliance partners are based in Australia, Europe, New Zealand and North America. Between us we are taking Faid^®Safe to the global market. We want to make this service available to every organisation that is exposed to fatigue risks. No matter where you are, we would like to hear from you. We want to add value to your business.

About the Custodian of the Brand

InterDynamics have been in the scheduling and risk business since 1992. InterDynamics has been privileged to work with leading operational practitioners, scientists and risk engineers to develop and deliver world class fatigue risk programs and products. Faid^®Safe is offered as a global benchmark for the fatigue risk management market.

For more information on InterDynamics, visit the InterDynamics website.

FAID^® received a WorkCover SA SAfeWork 2001 Award


	Focus on Fatigue For Managers, Supervisors and Employees Involved in Managing Fatigue Risk
Issue 3 - December 2007	The Faid^®Safe Alliance - professionals focused on fatigue risk protection
In This Issue Feature Article - Train Driving Efficiency and Safety Media Programme - Eyes Wide Open Research Corner - Managing Fatigue in Operational Settings Alliance Partner news Questions and Answers Working Globally About Us Products and Services Forums Downloads Resources Evaluation Software Download Fatigue Audit Software Special Offer Sleep and shiftwork books Contact Us InterDynamics Pty Ltd +61 2 9975 6925 www.faidsafe.com Alliance Partners Zurich Risk Engineering Shiftwork Services Integrated Safety Support InterDynamics Humantra Clockwork Research Centre for Sleep Research Avinet	Welcome to Focus on Fatigue, the official Faid^®Safe newsletter Is fatigue costing your organisation money? Yes, it is. When advising companies about their fatigue management policies we are often asked: what is the business incentive to ensure fatigue in the workforce is managed? Most people will appreciate the need to manage fatigue in order to ensure employee safety but what about the costs to an organization when an employee makes mistakes due to tiredness? A good example of the costs incurred was shown in the 4 Corners documentary, Eyes Wide Shut, in which it was reported that economists estimate that insomnia and other sleep disorders cost the community over $10 billion a year. Read more about this in the Media Programme below. Recent research in Australia provides evidence that thousands of dollars can be saved if steps are put in place to minimise fatigue in your employees. The Centre for Sleep Research, University of South Australia, analysed the performance of train drivers and found that the more fatigued a train driver is the more fuel they use. The study showed that fatigued driving becomes less well-planned, resulting in reduced efficiency with increased fuel consumption along with heavier braking and more speed violations. The extra cost to the organisation was calculated at AU$3,512 per week simply by using highly fatigued drivers rather than low ones. You can find more details about this research in our feature article, Train Driving Efficiency and Safety. This research has real world consequences. Don't sit back and accept fatigue as a cost of doing business. Imagine how much staff health and morale could be improved and the money that can be made, by investing in a fatigue risk management plan. Work safely, Fiona Johnston Shiftwork Services Feature Article - Train Driving Efficiency and Safety: Examining the Cost of Fatigue This is an example of savings that can be made when managing fatigue effectively. Sleep loss and fatigue are serious issues for train drivers, whose work hours are often long and uncertain and involve night and early morning shifts. Studies collecting subjective reports and sleep measures have recorded periods of drowsiness and even microsleeps while driving. Rail accident reports in numerous countries, including Australia, China, Japan and the US have cited work-related fatigue. Read the full article Media Programme - Eyes Wide Open Sleep deprivation is no trivial matter with economists estimating insomnia and other sleep disorders are costing the community over $10 billion a year. And then there's the human cost. Drowsy driving is a factor in over 16 per cent of fatal road accidents and nine per cent of work accidents are attributed to sleep deprivation. Going too long without sleep diminishes your ability to function. It's like being drunk. In the long term, lack of sleep is a contributing factor for heart disease, depression and diabetes. Eyes Wide Open programme guide Research Corner - Managing Fatigue in Operational Settings: Reflecting on NASA’s Ideas After More Than a Decade Sourced by Dr Adam Fletcher - Scientific Advisor to Faid^®Safe For this issue we have decided to get back to basics and review a pair of fatigue management articles that were written by the NASA Fatigue Countermeasures Group over ten years ago. At first glance it might strike many of us that very little has changed - the physiology of humans has certainly not adapted, and we are still suffering from the same symptoms and other consequences of fatigue. The 2 articles written by the NASA fatigue countermeasures group over 10 years ago, give us valuable reminders related to the critical importance of adequate sleep to prevent fatigue as well as details about common strategies including controlled napping, communication/supervision at work, use of caffeine (for those that choose to use it tactically), and the development of work patterns that consider circadian rhythms. There are however, things that have changed since these thorough, practical articles were written. For example, one of the suggested future pharmacological countermeasures, melatonin, has generally not been supported by research as a useable therapeutic for the general population (although it can have significant benefits in particular populations such as those with circadian misalignment sleep disorders). Also, caffeine is no longer understood to be any more a diuretic than plain water (see Armstrong, 2002 for a detailed review), so there is one less reason to be cautioning people against its use. Finally, the idea of an integrated fatigue management system has matured beyond the suggested approach which addresses issues such as hours of work, training and education, and the application of countermeasures in a modular way with minimal inter-connection. Faid^®Safe aims to address essential aspects of fatigue management in a more integrated way where information from one module (for example, Module 1: Hours of work diagnostic) actively informs other modules (such as Module 2: Fatigue hazard analysis, Module 5: Policies and procedures, and Module 9: Contingency and emergency plans). Nonetheless, there is a lot to be learned from looking at lessons from the past using articles such as these from NASA. We expect that you will be able to apply many of the suggestions as reminders or new ideas for you and your workforce. The articles mentioned can be accessed via the following links: Managing fatigue in operational settings I Managing fatigue in operational settings II Alliance Partner news Shiftwork Services Dr Kathy de Luc has joined Shiftwork Services, Kathy has extensive experience in management, organisational research and consultancy in both the private and public sectors in the United Kingdom and New Zealand. Her particular interest is in developing policies, procedures and research specific to the 24/7 workplace. Her aim is to provide practical, effective and simple answers for managers that can be translated into effective solutions. Kathy has enabled Shiftwork Services to expand its range of services and is a member of the Australasian Sleep Association. Shiftwork Services portfolio InterDynamics Adele Mitchell joined the InterDynamics team in October. Adele has an academic and educational background, plus over 20 years business experience, which combines well to support her professional focus of finding practical solutions for large and small businesses. This new business development role will support General Manager Len Pearson in extending the Faid^®Safe services to reduce the risk of fatigue hazards in the workplace, in Australia, NZ, the Americas and Europe. Adele is committed to lifelong learning and has been the plain language adviser on many corporate and public sector projects. In her current role, this is particularly useful when communicating with the technical specialists and range of management positions that are responsible for the Occupational Heath & Safety of organisations. Clockwork Research relocation Since forming in June 2005, Clockwork have gained a reputation as the European experts in the design and delivery of Fatigue Risk Management Systems (FRMS), having designed and implemented the easyJet Airline FRMS, widely recognised as an example of industry best practice. During this time the company has grown not only in size, but also in terms of the range and scope of projects undertaken, and a large proportion of the company's work is now in applied research. The Clockwork Research team was recently strengthened by the addition of Principal Researcher, Dr Samira Bourgeois-Bougrine, an Associate Professor at Laboratoire d'Anthropologie Applicquée of the University of Paris, and Researcher, Cassie Hilditch, formerly of the Adelaide Institute for Sleep Health in South Australia. Clockwork have also moved to larger offices to enable them to continue to grow, whilst maintaining the quality of services that their clients have come to expect. To assess fatigue risk in your organisation please contact one of the Faid^®Safe Alliance partners listed in the side bar. Questions and Answers Q. What is fatigue? A working definition of fatigue is that it is a dynamic balance between two competing forces. The forces producing fatigue and forces reversing the effects of fatigue, that is, recovery due to sleep. The main causes of work related fatigue are long hours and working when you would usually be sleeping. Day time sleep is not as restorative as night time sleep. When assessing fatigue the time of day or night work needs to be accounted for as well as the number of hours sleep achieved. Q. I would like to know, how is the fatigue calculated in FAID? The Fatigue Audit InterDyne^® is a work-related fatigue model. To quantify the work-related fatigue, FAID^® analyses planned or actual set of work hours and also estimates the quality and times of sleep from the work periods. In the FAID^® Outputs the Sleep Propensity Plots display an estimate of a persons sleep using as inputs: the time of day the person finished the shift and length of break. The fatigue and sleep models are based on 3,500 days of sleep/wake and work data collected over a two-year period from 250 Australian shiftworkers. Q. What should go into a fatigue management policy? A fatigue management policy needs to address both personal and systemic aspects of safety and performance. It needs to include fatigue assessments, risk assessments, training, accident and incident investigation and contingency plans. Implementing an FRMP in a modular, isolated form i.e. doing the separate elements one at a time e.g. training, assessing planned hours of work, assessing actual hours of work is less effective than using an integrated approach where all elements are worked on together. This helps in making sure each element of the policy informs other elements in order to form a cohesive integrated package. Working Globally Faid^®Safe alliance partners are based in Australia, Europe, New Zealand and North America. Between us we are taking Faid^®Safe to the global market. We want to make this service available to every organisation that is exposed to fatigue risks. No matter where you are, we would like to hear from you. We want to add value to your business. About the Custodian of the Brand InterDynamics have been in the scheduling and risk business since 1992. InterDynamics has been privileged to work with leading operational practitioners, scientists and risk engineers to develop and deliver world class fatigue risk programs and products. Faid^®Safe is offered as a global benchmark for the fatigue risk management market. For more information on InterDynamics, visit the InterDynamics website. FAID^® received a WorkCover SA SAfeWork 2001 Award