Long term effects of working night shifts

Nurses Stress 101

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Hello to all, I'm new on this site. I'm a nurse in the ED for 3 years now working the night shift (Which I love) i'm also in my last semester for my BSN and currently working on my capstone project. I need your help with a survey for my research paper. My question to you guys is...

What effects (long or short) have working the night shift have had in your overall health, family, lifestyle,?

Why you prefer night shift vs day shift? or vice versa, is it convenience? why or why not?

Any comments will be greatly appreciated it. Thanks in advance

I've been on nights for a year and I'm still miserable. I like the work better and I love my team but I feel terrible. I sleep very poorly during the day and not for very long. I waste my days off drowsy and napping on and off. My sleep on my nights off are interrupted by a few hours of wakefulness around 2 am. I'm 6 months pregnant now and counting down the days until I go out on leave. There's no way I will be able to go back with a baby at home.

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Specializes in LTC, assisted living, med-surg, psych.

I thrive on a swing shift schedule. I'm a night-owl, but not an ALL-night owl, if you know what I mean. I worked straight nights for years and loved it, but after about age 40, they stopped loving me and I began to forget where I was when I woke up in the afternoons or what day it was when assessing patients' mental status. :eek:

By contrast, I'd rather be shot than work 6-2.....early mornings and I are NOT friends, and it takes me at least an hour to clear the cobwebs out of my brain even in the best of times. I've done it, but never willingly.

Now my "schedule" (such as it is) is a hybrid of day and evening, which can start as early as 0900 and/or end as late as 2100. The vast majority of the time, I work only about 4-6 hours on a given day, but there have been a few that went 9-10 hours when I was getting several admissions throughout the day. Oddly enough, this works for me as I can't work full-time, but I can get through a long day because I know that the next will be different. Or, I won't have to work the next day at all. This leaves me free to pick up pieces of other days to do QA stuff, audit MARs/TARs, or whatever little tasks need doing.

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Specializes in PACU, pre/postoperative, ortho.
I thrive on a swing shift schedule. I'm a night-owl, but not an ALL-night owl, if you know what I mean. I worked straight nights for years and loved it, but after about age 40, they stopped loving me and I began to forget where I was when I woke up in the afternoons or what day it was when assessing patients' mental status. :eek:

By contrast, I'd rather be shot than work 6-2.....early mornings and I are NOT friends, and it takes me at least an hour to clear the cobwebs out of my brain even in the best of times. I've done it, but never willingly.

Ha, this sounds like me. I like my night shifts, but it's starting to wear on me (recent upheaval in mgmt & plummeting staff morale isn't helping). Contemplating a day position off the floor but leaving home at 0530 does not appeal to me at all!

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Specializes in Critical Care, ED, Cath lab, CTPAC,Trauma.
Ha, this sounds like me. I like my night shifts, but it's starting to wear on me (recent upheaval in mgmt & plummeting staff morale isn't helping). Contemplating a day position off the floor but leaving home at 0530 does not appeal to me at all!
I tried that once.....the noise level, the different departments, all the comings and going, all the docs and all the brass DROVE ME NUTS!!!!!!!!!!
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I wish someone would do a study on whether the health risks of night shift still apply if one gets enough sleep. I hear all the scary stories about cancer, etc. due to shift work, but I wonder how much of that is due to sleep deprivation. I sleep very well and work nights and I feel fine . . . although I do hate that first day off!

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In the last ten years, I know of three nurses I've worked night shifts with develop cancer. Two have since died from it. Not one had begun collecting their pensions.

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Specializes in Community Health/School Nursing.

I worked 12hr/night shifts for a year on an ortho/neuro floor. By month 7 I developed thyroid issues which caused me to rethink my work schedule. I could not sleep when I came home, I was extremely lethargic, mood swings, my mind felt foggy.....I ended up with a nodule on my thyroid which was biopsied (came back negative). By the end of the year I had enough.

I now work 5/8hr days....weekends/holidays off (school nurse) and I am the happiest I have been in a long time.

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Specializes in NICU, PICU, PCVICU and peds oncology.

The ability to maintain a regular routine of sleeping and being awake is so important on so many levels. People who work permanent days or permanent nights who have a routine are much healthier mentally and physically than those who can't. Many nurses in Canada work rotating shifts; I work a 12 hour day/night rotation with frequent flip-flops. The short changeover portion of my rotation is a killer - I come off a set of 3 nights at 0730 on Monday morning and have to be back at work at 0700 on Wednesday for 2 shifts, then flip back to nights again. THAT is hard on the body and the mind. The quality of my sleep is poor, even when I have a long stretch off. I have kidney stones. I have digestive issues. No fun.

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Specializes in Critical Care.
I wish someone would do a study on whether the health risks of night shift still apply if one gets enough sleep. I hear all the scary stories about cancer, etc. due to shift work, but I wonder how much of that is due to sleep deprivation. I sleep very well and work nights and I feel fine . . . although I do hate that first day off!

Sleep deprivation doesn't help in general but it's not the cause of an increased risk of cancer, MI, diabetes, and stroke in night shift workers. That difference is due primarily to lower melatonin levels and higher cortisol levels. No matter how much you sleep during the day you can't induce as much melatonin production as would have occurred had you been asleep or at least in a dark environment around 4 AM. If you're awake and particularly if you're exposed to blue wavelength lights around 4 am, your melatonin production will drop significantly and you can't catch up with daytime sleep even if you sleep 12 hours.

If it was just due to sleep, then we'd see higher rates of these condition in 8 hour workers compared to 12 hour workers, but we don't.

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I work 7pm-730am 3-4 times a week. Day shift is way too hectic. nights can be stressful and busy but it is different than on day shift. i try to keep the same schedule but come on... if i did i could never go out to run errands or shop at most places. I miss every holiday and many many other social events. I dont care about them much and as a nurse you are going to miss them whether you work nights or days. Other long term affects I am not really sure about. i guess i'll find out in a few years

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I've worked night **** for almost 3 years now. It used to be full time but now that I'm in school I only do 2 shifts a week. Any more than that would severely mess up being awake during the day for school and when I watch my best friends daughter one night/day a week. I don't get paid to babysit because she's like my niece and I offer to take her (if I don't have her once a week I get withdrawals lol) but what I like about my night shift at the hotel is that it's quiet enough to do my homework at times. :) can wait to not be stuck on nights though!

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OOPS! I guess my auto correct converted shift to... Yknow. I guess it's kinda fitting, but totally unintentional!

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