Sleep—Not Just Beauty Rest: An Innovative Approach to Reducing Healthcare Worker Fatigue

Growing research identifies that healthcare worker fatigue negatively impacts quality of care, patient safety, employee satisfaction, and the health of employees. Worker fatigue has been shown to increase the risk for patient care errors and employee injuries, smoking and alcohol abuse rates, chronic health issues, and drowsy driving rates.1, 2, 3, 4 and 5 However, there is little employee awareness or knowledge of worker fatigue and its impact on quality and safety and the ability to function as a high-reliability organization.