Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2016 Apr 26;315(16):1726-34.
doi: 10.1001/jama.2016.4454.

Association Between Rotating Night Shift Work and Risk of Coronary Heart Disease Among Women

Céline Vetter  1 , Elizabeth E Devore  1 , Lani R Wegrzyn  2 , Jennifer Massa  3 , Frank E Speizer  4 , Ichiro Kawachi  5 , Bernard Rosner  6 , Meir J Stampfer  7 , Eva S Schernhammer  8
Affiliations

Association Between Rotating Night Shift Work and Risk of Coronary Heart Disease Among Women

Céline Vetter et al. JAMA. .

Abstract

Importance: Prospective studies linking shift work to coronary heart disease (CHD) have been inconsistent and limited by short follow-up.

Objective: To determine whether rotating night shift work is associated with CHD risk.

Design, setting, and participants: Prospective cohort study of 189,158 initially healthy women followed up over 24 years in the Nurses' Health Studies (NHS [1988-2012]: N = 73,623 and NHS2 [1989-2013]: N = 115,535).

Exposures: Lifetime history of rotating night shift work (≥3 night shifts per month in addition to day and evening shifts) at baseline (updated every 2 to 4 years in the NHS2).

Main outcomes and measures: Incident CHD; ie, nonfatal myocardial infarction, CHD death, angiogram-confirmed angina pectoris, coronary artery bypass graft surgery, stents, and angioplasty.

Results: During follow-up, 7303 incident CHD cases occurred in the NHS (mean age at baseline, 54.5 years) and 3519 in the NHS2 (mean age, 34.8 years). In multivariable-adjusted Cox proportional hazards models, increasing years of baseline rotating night shift work was associated with significantly higher CHD risk in both cohorts. In the NHS, the association between duration of shift work and CHD was stronger in the first half of follow-up than in the second half (P=.02 for interaction), suggesting waning risk after cessation of shift work. Longer time since quitting shift work was associated with decreased CHD risk among ever shift workers in the NHS2 (P<.001 for trend). [table: see text]

Conclusions and relevance: Among women who worked as registered nurses, longer duration of rotating night shift work was associated with a statistically significant but small absolute increase in CHD risk. Further research is needed to explore whether the association is related to specific work hours and individual characteristics.

PubMed Disclaimer

References

    1. Costa G. The impact of shift and night work on health. Appl Ergon. 1996;27(1):9–16. - PubMed
    1. Knutsson A. Shift work and coronary heart disease. Scand J Soc Med Suppl. 1989;44:1–36. - PubMed
    1. Rüger M, Scheer FAJL. Effects of circadian disruption on cardiometabolic system. Rev Endocr Metab Disord. 2009;10(4):245–260. - PMC - PubMed
    1. Boggild H, Knutsson A. Shift work, risk factors and cardiovascular disease. Scand J Work Environ Health. 1999;25(2):85–99. - PubMed
    1. Knutsson A. Health disorders of shift workers. Occup Med. 2003;53(2):103–108. - PubMed

Publication types