What can I do as an employer?

Workplace sleep disorder screening and treatment program

Workplace sleepiness is a known risk factor for accidents and injuries, particularly for night shift workers. Sleepiness on-the-job also increases presenteeism and reduces productivity. While these risks exist due to sleepiness for any reason, workers with undiagnosed sleep disorders pose an additional health and safety risk to themselves, their colleagues and the general public. Sleepiness and sleep disorders also cost businesses money; in addition to the health-related costs due to accidents, injuries and poor worker health, which are relatively easy to measure, sleep disorders also lower productivity which is sometimes harder to detect.

It makes good business sense to invest in programs to help reduce sleep and sleepiness to reduce these identifiable and preventable factors that affect your bottom line.

There are a number of different ways in which a sleep disorders program can be rolled out. Businesses should review what might work best for them and, if you need to call in an expert for advice, you can contact the Australian Sleep and Alertness Consortium, a new research and development consortium focussing on the themes of sleep, health and wellbeing, and performance, across three integrated programs: Occupational, Healthcare, and Road Safety.