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Shift work increases risk for diabetes, especially mixed schedules
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The risk for diabetes is higher among shift workers — particularly men with schedules that vary — compared with adults who work normal office hours, according to a review published in Occupational & Environmental Medicine.
“Compared with individuals who had never been exposed to shift work, the risk of diabetes was increased by 9% for shift workers,” the researchers wrote.
Yong Gan, MD, of Huazhong University of Science and Technology in China, and colleagues undertook a meta-analysis of 12 observational international studies involving 226,652 participants, 14,595 of whom had diabetes.
The investigators identified the studies through PubMed, Embase, Web of Science and ProQuest Dissertation and Theses databases. All studies reported ORs for the associations between shift work and diabetes risk. Shift work was categorized as rotating, irregular, unspecified, night, mixed and evening.
The association between participants ever exposed to shift work and diabetes risk had a pooled adjusted OR of 1.09 (95% CI, 1.05-1.12). In analyzing subgroups, the association was stronger for men (OR=1.37; 95% CI, 1.2-1.56) than women (OR=1.09; 95% CI, 1.04-1.14). The pooled OR for workers with rotating shifts was 1.42 (95% CI, 1.19-1.69).
With the exception of mixed shifts and evening shifts, shift work schedules were associated with a statistically higher diabetes risk compared with normal daytime schedules; a significant difference was seen among those shift work schedules (P for interaction=.04).
“Given the increasing prevalence of shift work worldwide and the heavy economic burden of diabetes, the results of our study provide practical and valuable clues for the prevention of diabetes and a study of its etiology,” they wrote.
Disclosure: The researchers report no relevant financial disclosures.