14 DAY TRIAL // In a paper in the journal Diabetologia, researchers argue that people who work night shifts are more likely to get diabetes. The link was documented in the case of African-American women, but chances are that it holds true for men and women of other races as well.
More so given the fact that this paper is not the first to accuse night shifts of making folks more vulnerable to diabetes. On the contrary, it appears that several other investigations have until now found a link between this working schedule and an increase risk of said condition.
Documenting the link between night shifts and diabetes risk
Writing in the journal Diabetologia, the US researchers who conducted this study detail that, as part of their investigation, they enlisted 28,041 African-American women and asked them about their working hours. Specifically, the scientists wanted to know how many of them were working night shifts.
The investigation began back in 2005. At that time, none of the 28,041 women who agreed to take part in this research project was suffering from diabetes. The participants in the study were closely monitored for 8 years, during which time 1,786 were diagnosed with diabetes.
It is understood that, of these African-American women who developed said condition while monitored by the researchers, many worked night shifts prior to being diagnosed with diabetes. Thus, it is said that, on average, night shift workers were found to have a 22% higher risk for diabetes.
What's interesting is that this risk was found to vary greatly depending on how much time the women spent working during nighttime. Specifically, the increase in diabetes risk was found to be 17% for 1-2 years night shift work, and 23% and 42% for 3-9 years and 10 or more years, respectively.
To be thorough, the scientists also took into account lifestyle factors such as weight, diet and smoking behavior. Even so, they found the African-American women working night shifts to be more likely to be develop diabetes at some point in their life, Science Daily informs.
How night shifts make folks more vulnerable to diabetes
The researchers behind this study explain that night shift workers sleep less than other people. Besides, their circadian rhythm is greatly disrupted. What this means is that they feel sleepy when awake but fail to properly rest when off the clock. As a result, their metabolic functions get messed up.
“Shift work is associated with disrupted circadian rhythms and reduced total duration of sleep. Similar to the effects of jet lag, which are short term, shift workers experience fatigue, sleepiness during scheduled awake periods and poor sleep during scheduled sleep periods.”
“These alterations in the normal sleep-wake cycle have profound effects on metabolism. Even after many years of night-shift work, circadian rhythms do not fully adjust to the shifted sleep-wake cycle,” the specialists detail in the paper documenting their work.
In light of these findings, the researchers recommend that, to cut the costs associated with managing diabetes in the US and to improve on the population's general health condition, efforts be made to help night shift workers better adapt to their schedule, maybe even drop such working hours altogether.