Our filmmaking friends know about Shooting Day For Night, budget-stretching techniques which produce a reasonably plausible nighttime effect to film or video shot in the daytime. In Europe it is called nuit américaine> ("American night").
Filmmakers know about forced calls, too. This is a situation where cast or crew is due back on set sooner than their union rules allow, without penalty. As filmmaking is expensive, productions tend to work very full days while adjusting the next day's call times to avoid forced calls.
While Monday's call time might be 5:30 AM, Friday's could end up being ten, at night. Welcome to "Fraterday".
As one might imagine, this can play hell on the sleep schedule.
Police, Fire, EMS and hospital employees know our own versions of interesting work schedules, no doubt invented by permanent day-shift pencil pushers or by the bean counters. Charitably allowing that their intent was to make efficient use of scarce resources, there are still unintended consequences.
None the least of these is Shift Work Disorder (SWD). As the Author writes this a 1:17 AM, he considers if he could qualify as its poster child, juggling work in EMS, hospitals and the film industry.
Listen to conversations about work schedules and you may wonder if SWD can be aggravated by switching the days around, too. It says Saturday on the calendar, but one Nurse tells the Paramedic that it is her Friday. It is his Monday. The Police Officer says that yesterday was his Friday. Tuesday is his Monday, but he is working extra for two days.
No wonder that when a patient answers the "what day of the week is it" question, we far too often, look at each other hoping that somebody knows if he is correct.
The disorder is, of course, not limited to those careers. There are plenty of manufacturing, technology workers and others in the same boat.
The author recalls a computer systems analyst who slammed into daylight at the front door after working overnight. He seemed to stagger back a couple of steps, then lowered his head for another attempt to depart. He exclaimed, "Somebody forgot to pay the >dark> bill!"
"...difference between a day shift nurse and a night shift nurse? Forty pounds."
"What's the difference," asks the joke, "between a day shift nurse and a night shift nurse? Answer: Forty pounds."
In a 2012 article in the Journal of Clinical Psychiatry, Shift Work Disorder: Overview and Diagnosis, Thomas Roth, PhD note1 notes some of the possible consequences. People may experience increased risk of:
- gastrointestinal problems,
- cancer,
- depression,
- heart disease,
- excessive sleepiness and accidents, and
- decreased productivity.
Diagnosis
Roth states that some 10% of shift workers may suffer from the disorder. Could it be under diagnosed due to more prominent conditions, such as Clinical Depression, Alcoholism or other substance abuse?
It may also be self-diagnosed and self-treated and therefore underreported.
Watch for the continuation in
Part 2.
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1. J. Clin Psychiatry 2012;73(3):e09
10.4088/JCP.11073br2 Shift Work Disorder: Overview and Diagnosis
Thomas Roth, http://www.psychiatrist.com/education/Pages/brs01n02.aspx