Non-standard work hours, accidents and injuries among seafarers. A systematic Review

Abstract: Studies have shown that non-standard work hours are associated with an increased risk of accidents and injuries in healthcare, transportation and manufacturing sectors. Nevertheless, findings in Maritime work environment related to seafarers remain limited and inconsistent. To date, no meta-analytic synthesis has been published on this topic. We conducted a systematic review to examine whether exposure to non-standard work hours/shift work such as night shifts, extended work hours, rotation shifts is associated with an increased risk of accidents and injuries among seafarers. The study was registered in PROSPERO 2024 CRD42024543444.Methods: The review included 941 relevant original empirical studies from peer-reviewed electronic databases such as Ovid MEDLINE, PsycINFO, EMBASE and the Web of Science core collection using a predefined search strategy following the PRISMA (Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analysis) guidelines. Inclusion criteria yielded only three (03) studies in the final review, which did not specifically study the relationship between non-standard work hours and the occurrence of injuries and accidents in seafarers.Results: Studies were largely registry based, cross-sectional studies and reported accidents and injury rates as key outcomes. The studies were from multiple counties, including the UK, Norway, Sweden, Canada, Poland, Philippine, Croatia, Indonesia, Spain, South Africa, German, Hongkong, Russia, Poland, China, Italy and Denmark. In the Great Britain, 36% of the deaths at sea were caused by accidents (95% CI: 19.8-34.7, N=1405) between 1979/80 and 1982/3, with a fatal accident rate in seafaring of 51.6 per 100,000 seafarer-years. Higher accident frequency occurred during night shifts (00:00-04:00) than during normal day hours and were related to work schedules and sleep deprivation. Injury rate varied from 6.31 per 1,000 (95%CI: 4.98-7.85) seafarers-years (4-year period) in Italy, 43.7 per 100,000 seafarer-years in the UK, to 40 per 1,000,000 work hours in a multi country study (11- countries). Conclusion: This review shows a high rate of accidents and injury among seafarers documented in various studies across the globe and suggests that these incidents are more frequent during non-standard work hours. However, studies directly associating non-standard work shifts with the occurrence of accidents and injuries among seafarers are scarce, warranting further research in this area.

Keywords: non-standard work hours, seafarers, shift work, injury, accident, systematic review, observational.

DOI: 10.54941/ahfe1006542

Cite this paper:

​