Fatigue is a chameleon. It disguises itself as a rules violation, a lapse of attention, non-compliance, or that catch-all phrase, “human error”. We are dealing with the consequences of fatigue-related incidents on a regular basis without even knowing it. It’s time to open our eyes and see how fatigue lurks not only in our workers, but hidden in the design and management of our work systems! Watch this enlightening webinar led by Mike Harnett, President of Solaris Fatigue Management, a renowned expert in the science of fatigue and safety management systems. Hosted by Construction Health and Wellbeing LTD’s founder, Jennie Armstrong. In this webinar, Mike will delve into the fundamental changes needed in planning work activities, designing schedules, and evaluating errors through the lens of fatigue. With her background in human factors and sleep neurobiology, Mike’s insights are invaluable for optimising worker health, safety, and performance.
🎙️About Our Speaker: Mike Harnett Mike has worked with prestigious organizations such as the Canadian Standards Association, US Federal Rail Association, Transport Canada, and NASA. Her passion lies in guiding private industry to develop fatigue risk management plans and programs, making complex subjects accessible to all.
Watch the presentation: https://youtu.be/A0fBce90Iok?feature=shared
Asleep At The Wheel
Brutally long days and erratic sleep lead to accidents, chronic disease and depression.
Sedentary Woes
Headaches, eye strain, repetitive strain disorder paired with disease from a sedentary lifestyle plague post- production.
Do you know where your fatigue-related risks are? Do you have the right strategies in place? If you’re worried about the impact of fatigue at the job site, or simply don’t know where to start, we’re here to help!
In this informative interview by “The Canadian Ergonomist”, Mike Harnett, President of Solaris Fatigue Management, answers questions about her career as a Human Factors expert.
Mike Harnett is President of Solaris Fatigue Management, a consulting firm that optimizes worker health, safety and performance. With a background in human factors and sleep neurobiology, she is regarded as a subject matter expert on the science of fatigue, and has been a researcher and consultant to various government agencies including the Canadian Standards Association, Transport Canada, US Federal Rail Association and NASA.
She is currently helping to establish a new CSA standard addressing Fatigue Management for First Responders and is serving on the Expert Advisory Panel to a European Coalition assisting in the research and development of new AI technology for monitoring driver performance and cognitive load.
Mike is active in guiding private industry in the development of fatigue risk management plans, including transportation, mining, maritime, energy, construction, motion picture, and manufacturing sectors.
Mike is recognized for her ability to take complex subjects and deliver their content in a simplified and innovative manner for all to understand. An award-winning speaker, she is an internationally sought-after presenter, educator and advisor.
Brutally long days and erratic sleep lead to accidents, chronic disease and depression.
Sedentary Woes
Headaches, eye strain, repetitive strain disorder paired with disease from a sedentary lifestyle plague post- production.
Do you know where your fatigue-related risks are? Do you have the right strategies in place? If you’re worried about the impact of fatigue at the job site, or simply don’t know where to start, we’re here to help!
Mike Harnett, Leading Fatigue Expert, is interviewed along with other experts in this series “SafeSets”. Sleep deprivation is a common risk for anyone working in the film and television industry. In the first of these videos Harnett explains the dangers of fatigue and how it occurs . In the second video, Harnett discusses ergonomics and repetitive stress.
Host Paul Heinzelmann, MD, MPH, joins with cast, crew, and experts to discuss health and safety, and present fresh strategies for well-being in an industry full of hazardous conditions. Under pressure to meet tight schedules and long days, safety protocols get compromised to the determent of everyone in all areas of the production.
Heinzelmann hopes that newcomers, rebuking this unhealthy culture, will be the changemakers for these critical practises.
Asleep At The Wheel
Brutally long days and erratic sleep lead to accidents, chronic disease and depression.
Sedentary Woes
Headaches, eye strain, repetitive strain disorder paired with disease from a sedentary lifestyle plague post- production.
Do you know where your fatigue-related risks are? Do you have the right strategies in place? If you’re worried about the impact of fatigue at the job site, or simply don’t know where to start, we’re here to help!
Which is better? Standard time or daylight saving time?
On Sunday, Nov. 1, many Canadians will see time fall back, gaining an hour in the return to standard time (ST).
Ah, fall — that time of year when everything is spiced with pumpkin, old Halloween costumes are dusted off, and we get one blissful extra hour of sleep as we fall back to standard time (ST).
On Nov. 1, many jurisdictions across Canada will fall back an hour as daylight saving time (DST) ends for another year.
For many of us, it’s a way to catch up on some extra sleep that we need, since a majority of Canadian adults are not meeting the minimum of seven to nine hours of sleep per night.
The opposite of course is DST, where we spring forward an hour and actually lose an hour of sleep, temporarily adding to the sleep debt that many of us already have.
So why do we rotate between the two, and is one better than the other?
History of daylight saving
Many of us were told to blame the farmers for bringing in DST.
The truth is, it was first implemented in — wait for it — Port Arthur, Ont., in 1908.
This was followed by Australia, Great Britain, Germany and then the U.S., who implemented it as a means of conserving fuel (mostly coal) by reducing the need for artificial light during the First World War.
Since that time, there have been numerous studies that suggest any benefit of saved energy during the summer months are offset by the winter months.
Regardless of which side you lean to (DST or ST), pretty much everyone is in agreement that we hate having to switch back and forth between the two.
Daylight saving vs. standard time
The debate has now shifted to which one is better. And the gloves are coming off.
People are confused by DST and ST.
Very simply, DST has us wake up earlier (in darker hours) and gives us sunlight later in the day and evening hours.
On the surface, this sounds great! We can stay up longer and cram more into our evening hours.
Businesses such as restaurants, tourism and entertainment venues will see the commercial benefit.
Detrimental effects of DST
The downside of DST? We are harming ourselves physically, mentally and emotionally.
Light is the primary synchronizer of our body clock, keeping our circadian rhythms in harmony with each other and the light-dark rotation of our planet.
As a diurnal species, we are designed to rise with the sun and set with the sun.
What DST does is force us to work against the planet, causing our rhythms to not only drift, but desynchronize. Waking up when it’s still dark outside becomes more difficult, as we’re programmed to get our best sleep during those hours.
The result is that we wake up with more sleep inertia — that groggy feeling that makes us want to throw our alarm through the wall into the room next door.
Think of how this may affect you. We now have groggy bus drivers transporting our groggy kids to school, and groggy commuters wreaking havoc on the roads as we try to make our way to work.
What about those who work night shifts, you ask? Won’t it help them? To some degree, yes. But it will make their dayshift assignments a real problem!
We will see more errors and incidents at the worksite in the morning hours and poorer shift handovers during the morning exchange. There is no benefit to rotating shift workers.
The argument for permanent ST
The later we have sunlight exposure due to DST, the harder it will be to fall asleep at our “normal” bedtime.
You will be pushed to a later start time, not only because of the psychological effect of light at in the evening, but because light reduces melatonin production — our natural sleep hormone.
Melatonin helps us fall asleep and stay asleep. Without it, we incur less quantity and quality of sleep.
There are additional consequences to this, including a negative impact on our immune system (hello, COVID-19) and our mood (welcome, anti-depressants) and less clean-up of the toxins in our brain from the double whammy of being awake longer and getting less sleep (nice to meet you, Alzheimer’s disease).
Leading sleep neurobiologists and circadian researchers worldwide are in agreement — to keep our body clock in sync with our solar clock, it is best to eliminate DST and stay on permanent ST.
I’m staring daggers at my coffeemaker impatiently drumming my fingers against my chipped mug, swearing at it to hurry up.
Today, I need to jump-start my brain. I’m on edge. Sleep didn’t come easy after watching the late night news, something I normally and deliberately avoid. I tossed and turned, worried about COVID, and racism, and riots, and the economy, and a second coming of the toilet paper famine.
I’m hoping the coffee will make me feel less… murdery.
Brew now in hand, I step outside and pace around the yard. It’s no surprise that stress is taking a toll on us. Stress typically turns off when the stressors disappear. But what makes our current situation unique is that the stress isn’t going away, and there’s no timeline for when it will.
The truth is, we may never experience a return to normal as we knew it pre-2020.
SLEEPLESSNESS COMES FIRST, THEN STRESS
In the past, stress, depression and mental health disorders were viewed as a cause of insomnias and other sleep disorders. Only recently has science revealed that it’s actually the opposite. In fact, the less sleep, the higher the risk for mental health issues such as depression, schizophrenia, low impulse control and suicidal thoughts.1
So, in order to maintain a healthy mind, we need a healthy sleep. Most of us now recognize that adults require at least 7-9 hours of quality sleep to repair the brain and body from the stressors of the day.2
More specifically, it is during the latter part of our sleep period that we spend most of our time in REM sleep. This is the critical period for our brain to recharge both our cognitive abilities and emotional tolerances. If we can’t fall asleep, or cut our sleep short, or wake up throughout the night, you will be lacking the tools to deal with the next challenge 2020 throws at us.
Therein lies the conundrum. A lack of sleep escalates our stress, and the more stress, the more cortisol and adrenaline are dumped into our system, escalating our sleeplessness. A vicious cycle erupts.
And that’s why I step outside. To break the cycle!
THE FIX
How does stepping outside help? It’s simple really.
Sunlight.
Yup… that’s the key to managing all this toxic plume swirling around us. Well, it’s one of the keys. A really big key. The biggest key.
Here’s the science. As humans, our sleep-wake cycle is controlled by the amount and timing of light exposure. Sunlight is the single most powerful synchronizer we have, regulating our mood, energy levels, and sleep abilities by making sure our body rhythms work in harmony with each other, not against each other.
When we go out into the bright sunlight, it converts certain foods that contain tryptophan into serotonin. How much is produced is directly related to the amount of tryptophan in your diet and the amount of bright sunlight you’re exposed to in the day. The brighter the sunshine and the longer you’re exposed to it, the more serotonin produced.
Serotonin is known as one of our “happiness” hormones, giving us sensations of joy and pleasure, and basically making us nice people to be around. We’re kinder, communicate better (without swearing) and are less likely to over-react when the kids paint the dog.
Sunshine = increased stress tolerance and better mood – Check!
But that’s not all it does. When the sun starts to set, the brain reaches into our serotonin stores and converts it to melatonin. Melatonin is our natural sleep hormone, helping us to fall asleep and stay asleep throughout the night. Low serotonin means low melatonin.
Sunshine = better and more sleep – Check!
So, to help us cope with pandemics, protests, and people in general, we need to do two things.
1. Eat a diet rich in tryptophan.
Tryptophan is especially high in proteins such as fish, meat, eggs, dairy and nuts and we need sufficient quantities to produce serotonin. Quinoa gets a shout out as well.
You can also get it as a nutritional supplement if you’re worried you’re not getting enough – I’m looking at you vegans!
2. Get outside.
Morning sun is preferable as it synchronizes our body rhythms to a daytime schedule. On a cloudless day, depending on the time of year, it can range from 10,000 to 50,000 lux of light!
Even on a cloudy day, the lux levels outside are significantly higher than in your house or office which sit around 300 – 500 lux of light. So pull on those rain boots and strut outside for an hour or so.
In winter time, especially for us pasty-faced Canadians, we have less light exposure, which explains why depression levels are so much higher during that time of year. There are all kinds of light boxes that you can buy to help you get the light fix you need. Just be sure to get one that replicates at least 10,000 lux of light.
Unfortunately, working at night or having an erratic sleep schedule can further disrupt serotonin production and subsequently, melatonin levels. Here’s where many of our frontline workers are at elevated risk. The low serotonin levels can result in sleep disorders such as insomnia, in addition to increases in mood swings, anger levels, and even addictive behaviours.3
Using a light box can provide significant benefits to these workers when walking in sunshine isn’t an option.
While some may think that buying synthetic melatonin is the answer, they are a complex hormone that, if taken in the wrong amount, or not timed correctly, can create significant health consequences. Our melatonin requirements vary wildly from person to person and even day to day. Recent research illustrates the many risks associated with it and why we should limit its use.4
CONCLUSION
Sunshine helps us develop our body’s natural defences against stress by improving sleep. Since your brain can’t repair itself while you’re sitting on the couch watching The Real Housewives of Moose Jaw, go outside and catch some rays.
1Brooks, Megan. (2014, June 2). Suicide More Likely After Midnight. https://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/826054
2National Sleep Foundation Recommends New Sleep Times | Sleep Foundation. (2020). Retrieved 29 July 2020, from https://www.sleepfoundation.org/press-release/national-sleep-foundation-recommends-new-sleep-times
3 Pirola, Carlos J. (2007). Serotonin and Serotonin Transporter Gene Variant in Rotating Shift Workers. Sleep. Aug. 2007
4 Cipolla-Neto, José; Gaspar do Amaral, Fernanda. (2018). Melatonin as a Hormone: New Physiological and Clinical Insights, Endocrine Reviews, Volume 39, Issue 6, December 2018, Pages 990–1028.
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