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Occupational Medicine Advance Access originally published online on August 8, 2007
Occupational Medicine 2007 57(6):449-452; doi:10.1093/occmed/kqm047
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© The Author 2007. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the Society of Occupational Medicine. All rights reserved. For Permissions, please email: journals.permissions@oxfordjournals.org

Short Reports

Working hours and mental and physical fatigue in Japanese workers

Shouji Nagashima1, Yasushi Suwazono1, Yasushi Okubo2, Mirei Uetani1, Etsuko Kobayashi1, Teruhiko Kido3 and Koji Nogawa1

1 Department of Occupational and Environmental Medicine, Graduate School of Medicine, Chiba University, Chiba, Japan
2 Health Care Center, University of Tokyo, Tokyo, Japan
3 Department of Community Health Nursing, Kanazawa University School of Health Sciences, Ishikawa, Japan

Background Establishing a threshold number of working hours is very important when making recommendations to protect people from the potentially harmful health effects caused by long working hours.

Aim To clarify the influence of working hours on both mental and physical symptoms of fatigue and use the data obtained to determine permissible working hours.

Methods Cross-sectional survey of male day-shift workers using the Self-Rating Depression Scale (SDS) and the Cumulative Fatigue Symptoms Index (CFSI). Working hours were subdivided into six groups and odds ratios were calculated for positive outcomes on the SDS and CFSI using logistic regression analysis.

Results A total of 715 workers participated. In the group working 260–279 h/month, the odds ratios for SDS and ‘irritability’, ‘anxiety’ and ‘chronic tiredness’ of the CFSI were significantly increased. In the group working ≥280 h/month, the odds ratios on CFSI for ‘general fatigue’, ‘physical disorders’, ‘anxiety’ and ‘chronic tiredness’ were likewise significantly increased.

Conclusions The present results clarified that working hours should be <260 h/month in order to minimize fatigue symptoms in male day workers.

Keywords      Chronic fatigue; epidemiological study; long working hours; mental health

Correspondence to: Yasushi Suwazono, Department of Occupational and Environmental Medicine (A2), Graduate School of Medicine, Chiba University, 1-8-1 Inohana, Chuo-ku, Chiba 260-8670, Japan. Tel: +81 43 226 2065; fax: +81 43 226 2066; e-mail: suwa{at}faculty.chiba-u.jp


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