Sleep Usually Sacrificed in Early Morning Work Schedules

Early to bed and early to rise makes a man healthy, wealthy, and wise, so starting work at the crack of dawn shouldn’t be that difficult, right? In theory it’s not, but modern lifestyles make the old saying unrealistic. The early risers rarely go to sleep early enough, according to a new survey published in the journal Chronobiology International.

More than 1 in 10 people occasionally wake up before sunrise to go to work. About 2 percent of people do it all the time. But bedtimes rarely change.

Total sleep time ends up falling because of the schedule. People who report to work between 3:00 a.m. and 4:30 a.m. usually slept for less than five hours per night.

Study subjects signaled such sleep loss leads to dissatisfaction with work, fatigue
and feelings of not being well rested. Some workers reported trouble sleeping while on early work schedules.

The findings should raise some eyebrows for managers responsible for scheduling employees. Productivity is bound to drop when employees are tired and unhappy.

Sleep disorder or not it’s hard to blame early morning workers for staying up past 9 p.m., after all they have the same modern obligations and distractions as everyone else.