Health Assessment of Shift Workers in a Automobile Manufacturing Plant

Lee, Jung Jeung; Chung, Jong Hak

Abstract

An investigation on psychophysiological health and social well-being of shift workers been carried out on workers of a automobile manufacturing plant in Ulsan. for 1 month from April, 1993. This cross-sectional survey compared shift workers(n=544) with day workers(n=l15). Each subject completed a questionnaire about his personal habit background. shift schedule. sleep and eating patterns. subjective digestive symptom and psychological well-being and distress using the General Well-Being schedule(GWB) by self administrated questionnaire that was developed for the U. S. Health and Nutrition Examination surveys (HANES I). chi-square analysis was used for discontinuous data and the t-test was used for continous data to determine whether differences noted between the two groups. In terms of sleep quality, a greater percentage of shift workers frequently had trouble getting back to sleep once awakend(p<0.01) and a greater percentage of shift workers awakend tired or sleepy frequently more often than day workers(p<0.05). In rating the quality of their sleep, more shift workers rated their sleep fair to poor than day workers, and greater percentage of shift workers felt tired or sleepy at work two or more times per week(p<0.01) and a much higher percentage of shift workers felt tired or sleepy after work every days(p<0.01). In terms of sleep patterns, a much higher percentage of day workers reported uninterrupted sleep per 24hours than shift workers. The shift workers reported different eating patterns from day workers but there were no statistically significant and rate of their appetite. Thirteen percent of day workers reported the best appetite but only 6.6% of shift workers had the best appetite. The gastric complaints is more frequent in shift workers than day workers(p<0.01). Among subscores in General Well-Being Schedule, anxiety, depression, positive well-being and vitality subscale of shift workers were lower than those of day workers(p<0.05) and general health and self control subscale of shift workers were lower than those of day workers but there were no statistical significant difference. Based on these study result, it could be concluded that the shift work has significant effects on some psychophysiological conditions of the workers.