Driving Safety Among Surgical Residents in the Era of Duty Hour Restrictions

The relationship between burnout, commuting crashes and drowsy driving among hospital health care workers

“…The sociodemographic characteristics associated with drowsy driving included male gender and lower seniority. These were previously found to be associated with traffic crashes among HCWs and the general population (Zuwairy et al 2020 ; Rios et al 2020 ; Freedman-Weiss et al 2021 ; The National Authority for Road Safety 2020 ), which strengthens the validity of our findings. These findings reflect the importance of raising awareness and allocating resources towards the safety of younger workers and male workers who are at higher risk for both burnout and commuting crashes (Dyrbye et al 2014 ; Barger et al 2005 ).…”

“…Reports on commuting crashes and drowsy driving among HCWs vary among different studies. For example, commuting crashes among physicians range in studies between 10 and 56% (Barger et al 2009 ; West Tan and Shanafelt 2012 ; Freedman-Weiss et al 2021 ) and drowsy driving ranges between 13 and 80% among nurses (Vedaa et al 2019 ; Scott et al 2007 ; Dorrian et al 2006 , 2008 ). Our findings regarding reported commuting crashes and drowsy driving falls approximately in the middle of these ranges.…”

“…Previous literature showed that work-related injuries affect the physical and mental health of HCWs, and may result in high absence, turnover, and costs (Cooke and Stephens 2017 ; Joseph and Joseph 2016 ). Since shift-work was previously associated with traffic crashes (Zuwairy et al 2020 ; Freedman-Weiss et al 2021 ), it is likely that among HCWs, traffic crashes will occur more commonly during commuting. Our findings raise the importance of treating commuting crashes as occupational traffic crashes universally.…”

“…Long shifts, night shifts, irregular shifts, fatigue and lower seniority level were found to be associated with more commuting crashes, near-misses and drowsy driving among HCWs, while younger age and male gender were found to be associated only with more commuting crashes and near-misses (Barger et al 2005 , 2009 ; Zuwairy et al 2020 ; Smith et al 2021 ; Freedman-Weiss et al 2021 ; Green et al 2020 ).…”