Almost all occupations or industries have employees engaged in shift work. Shift work has been associated with a number of health problems including cardiovascular disease, glucose and lipid metabolism, gastrointestinal, reproduction difficulties, and breast cancer.
Number of persons doing shift work appears to be increasing. It ranges from 10–25% of all those employed. To study the effect of night shift work on lipid profile in industrial workers at Burla, a study was conducted in day workers (n = 50) and night shift workers (n = 50). The end points were increase in serum total cholesterol, increase in LDL, VLDL, decrease in HDL from baseline during the period of observation. The association between shift work and lipid disorders was investigated adjusting for age, body mass index. Study among the industrial workers revealed that night shift work was a significant independent risk factor for lipid disorder.
shift work, total cholesterol, triglycerides, HDL, LDL, VLDL
