Irregular working hours make weight loss difficult
Timo Saari works as the driver of a sewer cleaning lorry. The working hours can be quite long and a father with young children also has things to do at home. “An eight-hour workday would be ideal; then I would have time for hobbies too,” Saari says. Does losing weight make lorry drivers more alert? This was investigated in a research project at the UKK Institute for Health Promotion Research in Tampere, Finland. The research participants were lorry and bus drivers who drive long distances and whose waist circumference measured more than one metre, in other words they were abdominally obese.
However, their weight loss results were quite modest. The drivers lost on average 3.5 kilos in a year.
The research director, docent of exercise and sports medicine, medical specialist Katriina Kukkonen-Harjula says that the working conditions are at least partly to blame for the scant results.
Drivers work for very long hours
“Nevertheless, the participants were volunteers and eager to change their life-styles. Perhaps the conclusion we should draw is that the tight driving schedules and long working hours prevent the adoption of healthy habits,” Kukkonen-Harjula says.
“Some drivers slept for really short times. When you are on the road, you don’t have a lot of time off, especially if you drive down south in Europe.”
The aim of the randomised study was to get the drivers to lose 10 percent of their body mass in one year. Their average starting weight was 107 kilos so the target weight loss was almost 11 kilos.
The research was a part of the Academy of Finland Research Programme on the Future of Work and Well-being which ended in 2011. Collaborating researchers came from the Institute of Occupational Health and the Helsinki Sleep Clinic.
Metreman leaflets for occupational health services
The drivers’ life-styles were influenced by regular one-on-one counselling about life-style choices. The researched drivers kept a diary of their diets, exercise and sleep.
“Excess weight is often associated with tiredness and tiredness is the enemy in the work of the long-distance driver. To our knowledge, nobody in the world has researched whether weight loss achieved by life-style changes can improve alertness,” says docent of exercise and sports medicine Katriina Kukkonen-Harjula. Half of the study population of 113 persons started to get monthly counselling on life-style right from the start of the project. The other half was the control group and they were counselled after one year of the start of the project but for a shorter time than the other group.
During the first year, when the control group got no counselling, their weight increased on average by half a kilo.
“If we had done nothing, the drivers’ weight would have increased by a kilo or two per year,” Kukkonen-Harjula says.
The metremen were encouraged to be physically active by giving them pedometers. The aim was to fulfil the recommendation for health-enhancing physical activity for adults, which is a half an hour’s brisk walk five times a week.
”After the two-kilometre UKK Walk Test the participants took at the start of the project, the testers said that this group was especially slow and their endurance fitness was low. We recommended walking because it is easy to do in short bouts during the breaks in the workday.”
There are no tailored statutory services in occupational health care to workers who work irregular hours. Therefore three leaflets were written in the Metreman project on sleep, food and exercise. These are meant to be used by health professionals to counsel healthy living habits with workers who work irregular working hours and who have some cardiovascular risk factors, e.g. overweight.
Next spring the UKK Institute will also organise a training day on the fitness, heart health and work ability of professional drivers. It is continuing training offered to professional lorry and bus drivers and approved by the Finnish Transport Safety Agency.
Does alertness improve by weight loss?
Being overweight is often associated with tiredness and tiredness is an enemy of the long-distance driver.
The drivers’ reaction times were tested in the sleep and alertness part of the Metreman project.
“To our knowledge, nobody in the world has studied whether weight loss achieved by changes in diet and physical activity can improve workers’ alertness,” Kukkonen-Harjula says.
”You can think about this simply. If you sleep too little, you are tired and grumpy during the day. It is then more difficult to make healthy food choices on the road and you have no energy for exercise after the workday. Obesity can cause continuous, low-grade infection in the adipose tissue and this is bad for the blood vessels in the body. Short sleep and fatty foods increase the feelings of tiredness.
Results on whether or not weight loss had an effect on the alertness of the drivers are undergoing statistical analyses.
Text Tiina Lankinen
Photographs Teemu Launis
Translation Laura Tohka
Lorry driver switched to salads
”The talk about lorry drivers’ portions is true. Many workmates go for a long time without eating and then they have a hamburger or a kebab in the afternoon.”
Timo Saari, 44, has worked as a lorry driver for more than twenty years. He is now driving a sewer cleaning lorry in Kangasala and Tampere. His normal workdays are eight hours and the hours take place between seven and five, but sometimes he has to work irregular hours.
The work involves sitting in the lorry, but from time to time the job is also physically demanding as the heavy waste hoses have to be dragged in very difficult spots.
Saari participated in the Metreman project because he wanted to take better care of his health. He lost less than five kilos during the research but he intends to lose more. He would like to increase the time spent exercising, but for a father with small children, exercise often means just hanging around outside with the kids.
”An eight-hour workday would be best. Then I would have time for hobbies too,” Saari says.
According to Saari, the traditional dieting and exercise counselling offered in the research project worked well, at least in his case. Today Saari pays attention to portion size; he eats more vegetables and protein and tries to sleep for longer than before. He also tries to fit coffee and lunch breaks in his workday.
His workmates do not make fun of him even though Saari chooses to have a salad for lunch instead of a hamburger.
This story was originally published in Finnish in Aikalainen 18/2012
