OBJECTIVE To evaluate sleep, alertness, salivary cortisol levels, and autonomic activity in the afternoon and morning shifts of a sample of short-distance bus drivers. METHODS A sample of 47 bus drivers was evaluated. Data regarding subjects and working characteristics, alertness (psychomotor vigilance task), sleep habits (Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index, Epworth Sleepiness Scale, Actigraphy),...

The purpose of the study was to examine whether poor working conditions influenced drivers' psychological health, and to identify drivers' personality characteristics. The subjects were 208 bus drivers working in the European sector in Istanbul. Their personality characteristics, psychological symptoms and anxiety levels were investigated using the Eysenck Personality Questionnaire (EPQ), the S...

BACKGROUND Bus and truck drivers are apparently more involved in metabolic syndrome and its complications due to their working conditions. The related impacts are not only harmful for driver's health, but also may endanger others. The present research was carried out to determine the prevalence of metabolic syndrome among bus and truck drivers in Kashan, a city in Iran. MATERIALS In 2007, 429...

OBJECTIVES To study the risk of lung cancer in different subgroups of professional drivers in urban and rural areas of Sweden. METHODS Information on occupation and geographical region was obtained from the Swedish census of 1970 and data on the incidence of lung cancer between 1971 and 1984 from the National Swedish Cancer Registry. Professional drivers were separated into bus, taxi, and lon...

Human exposure to genotoxic compounds present in ambient air has been studied using selected biomarkers in nonsmoking Danish bus drivers and postal workers. A large interindividual variation in biomarker levels was observed. Significantly higher levels of bulky carcinogen-DNA adducts (75.42 adducts/10(8) nucleotides) and of 2-amino-apidic semialdehyde (AAS) in plasma proteins (56.7 pmol/mg prot...

A prior study in New York City observed that airborne concentrations of three metals found in steel - iron, manganese, and chromium - are more than 100 times higher in the subway system than in aboveground air. To investigate the potential for health effects of exposure at these levels, we conducted a pilot study of subway workers comparing personal exposures to steel dust with biomarkers of me...

introduction: sleepiness may predispose drivers to road traffic accidents. obstructive sleep apnea syndrome is the most common medical cause of sleepiness. hence increased neck circumference (nc) and obesity are known as obstructive sleep apnea syndrome risk factors. this study was conducted to assess osas role in occurrence of road traffic accidents in sleeping drivers of commercial heavy vehi...

BACKGROUND Sleepiness while driving has been regarded as a major cause of death due to traffic accidents. We compared the degree of sleepiness across five different working time periods (first, morning, post-lunch, afternoon, and last) among Korean bus drivers with different shift types (Daily two shift/Alternating day shift). METHOD We interviewed 332 bus drivers with two shift types (Daily ...