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New data reveal substantial productivity benefit using Readi fatigue management system

Fatigue Science, the global leader in predictive fatigue analytics and information systems for mining, transportation and heavy industry, is pleased to announce the results of two recent studies that quantified the significant improvement in mine productivity resulting from the implementation of Readi, its fatigue management software.

Fatigue Science announces release of 14-Day Fatigue Forecasting, enabling workforce planning 14 days in advance

Readi Enterprise Suite, the Fatigue Management Information System from Fatigue Science, is widely relied upon for its ability to provide objective historical and real-time visibility into workforce fatigue. Now, the release of 14-Day Fatigue Forecasting expands this visibility into the future, providing the world’s first “360º view of fatigue – past, present, and future.” With this advancement, proactive planning measures and proactive safety-critical actions that were previously impossible are now visible and achievable.

Introducing the Fatigue Science 90-Day Pilot Program

Mining truck at a mining site.

When introducing a new initiative into a workforce, it’s important to prepare for feedback, change management, and policy development. With that in mind, Fatigue Science provides a 90-day Pilot Program to help implement Readi™ Enterprise Suite as part of your company’s approach to fatigue risk management.

During your 90-day pilot, a Fatigue Science advisor will work with operations leaders and health and safety managers to understand the outcomes you’re looking to achieve with your deployment of Readi Enterprise Solution. Whether you’re looking to reduce fatigue exposure to improve safety, productivity, or both, an advisor can help select the best staff at your company, and create a deployment plan that fits your pilot objectives.

Readi™ Enterprise Suite 

Fatigue Science’s 90-Day Pilot Program gives you the opportunity to trial the Readi Enterprise Suite Solution with leadership, supervisors, and staff:

  • Readi provides personal Fatigue Alerts on mobile and wrist with compatible wearables, as well as a daily Fatigue Forecast upon wake-up, providing at-a-glance insight into personal fatigue risks for the day ahead. Users additionally receive sleep and fatigue insights such as a ReadiScore™ that allows them to make better choices based on their risk level.
  • ReadiSupervise enables supervisors to monitor current and upcoming fatigue levels of each member of their crew, with an “on-duty dashboard” and risk alert notifications. These tools enable informed interventions in cases of critical fatigue, as well as the planning of key tasks, ultimately driving productivity and reducing accidents.
  • ReadiAnalytics™ provides aggregated insights into workforce fatigue at the group-, location-, and organization-level, enabling management to establish a fatigue baseline, identify problem areas, and track improvements over time relative to meaningful targets. Insights for leaders can inform planning for resource allocation, fatigue training, and schedule optimization, further driving safety and productivity.

Your advisor will help to break down the data from each of these applications to target your key metrics, as well as to discuss potential fatigue management strategies.

Orienting Yourself and Your Staff

A pilot program typically lasts three months, which provides time for workforce orientation with Readi, identification of trends, and strategies to reduce fatigue-related risk in your workforce.

A pilot covers all phases of Readi’s use within your organization, from pre-launch and the initial roll-out, managing participation, data collection and analysis, actionable takeaways, and next steps.

By the end of your pilot program, you will be prepared to:

  • Understand the level of fatigue exposure across your company. This includes clear takeaways for leadership, supervisors, and staff that can help to reduce fatigue risks at all levels.
  • Determine a path forward for utilizing the predictive fatigue risk management tools of Readi Enterprise Suite on an ongoing basis in your operation. This includes a breakdown of the targets that will help you to reach your organizational goals and the methods to measure them.
  • Identify and adjust for the root causes of fatigue within your company and implement solutions. This includes adjusting work schedules, optimizing processes, and introducing training to educate staff.
  • Understand how daily sleep and fatigue insights can allow participants to optimize their work day, plan for sleep, and increase awareness of heightened fatigue risk.

Talk to Our Team!

As no two workplaces are the same, fatigue risk management strategies must be tailored to meet the unique needs of an organization. Whether your work environment includes shift work, long commutes, or high-risk work, your plan for fatigue management should be comprehensive.

Our pilot program is designed with the complexity of your organization in mind. To speak with one of our advisors about implementing a 90-day pilot within your company, contact our team here.

Interested in learning more about data-driven fatigue management?

or download our free eBook on the Science of Sleep for industrial workforces

About Fatigue Science

Fatigue Science is the leading provider of predictive human performance data in heavy industry, elite sports, and military. Headquartered in Vancouver, Canada, we build software that leverages scientifically-validated biomathematical models in order to quantify and predict the cumulative effects of sleep disruption on human reaction time and cognitive effectiveness. Our solutions enable organizations to optimize operations, reduce risk, and drive performance and productivity improvements — both at an individual- and enterprise-level. With proven impact, return on investment, and significant and growing traction in heavy industry, military, and elite sports, Fatigue Science serves cutting-edge organizations who understand the importance of sleep as well as the value of data-driven decision-making.

Introducing ReadiAnalytics: real-time objective visibility into workforce fatigue

Unlike subjective methods for estimating crew fatigue, ReadiAnalytics captures anonymous sleep data from a sample of crew workers and then processes it alongside a variety of circadian factors with a scientifically-validated biomathematical model. The model then quantifies which on-duty crews will be the most and least fatigued, and how that fatigue will trend over time as their shift pattern progresses. Crucially, worker privacy is preserved, as insights are anonymized and aggregated for each crew, site, and the company. 

The sleepy surgeon: a look at surgeon fatigue

It doesn’t matter what uniform you put on or what education you have, we are all human beings subject to the laws of nature.

In modern medical research there is less and less criticism of the methodology of published research and more and more criticism of the interpretation of the results.  What does the research really mean outside the context of the immediate research subjects?  Case in point, a January 2015 publication in the American Journal of Surgery entitled: “The Sleepy surgeon: does night-time surgery for trauma affect mortality outcomes?

The research has been characterized as saying that trauma surgery is not any riskier at night than during the day, “The studies here add to a growing body of evidence suggesting that surgeons, particularly experienced surgeons, can devise techniques to compensate for sleep deprivation” (Dr Carlos Pellegrini, University of Washington).

Really? What are these magical techniques? The fact is they don’t exist. This is a classic case of overreach and over interpretation of a narrow study. The research itself appears robust, the conclusions: not so much.

They looked at 2007-2010 data from the National Trauma Bank on 16,096 exploratory laparotomies started between midnight and 6 am and 15,109 between 7 am and 5 pm.  They concluded that there was no statistical difference with respect to patient deaths between night time and day time surgeries.  That sounds interesting.  Except, as Dr Pellegrini points out, “The exploratory laparotomy in general is a relatively straightforward procedure for which mortality and morbidity are very low.”

So, surgeons don’t make more mistakes, leading to patient deaths, following a simple procedure at night.  That’s about it.  Surgeons often perform many more complex surgeries. What about those?

It turns out that surgeons are diurnal human beings like the rest of us. In 2012 the FAA’s Civil Aerospace Medical Institute published a study on fatigue and concluded:

In terms of vulnerability to fatigue, we believe it is reasonable to assume that the professional cabin crew population is not inherently different at the genetic/ biological level than any other sub-group within the aviation community. Similarly, it is reasonable to assume that the commercial aviation population is not inherently different than any other group of generally healthy adults exposed to round-the-clock work schedules.

It doesn’t matter what uniform you put on or what education you have, we are all human beings subject to the laws of nature.  In 2012 Harvard medical school teamed up with Massachusetts General Hospital to study the fatigue of Orthopaedic residents. They measured their actual sleep using FDA cleared Readiband technology and their actual fatigue levels using the highly validated SAFTE bio-mathematical model and concluded:

“Residents were fatigued during 48% and impaired during 27% of their time awake. Among all residents, the mean amount of daily sleep was 5.3 hours. Overall, residents’ fatigue levels were predicted to increase the risk of medical error by 22% compared with well-rested historical control subjects.  Night-float residents were more impaired (P=.02), with an increased risk of medical error (P=.045).”

Residents were fatigued during 48% and impaired during 27% of their time awake.

In 2014 the American College of Surgeons published the following findings:

  • Fatigue has significant detrimental effects, including prolonged reaction time, decreased vigilance, impaired decision making, and delayed recognition of critical situations.*
  • Individuals vary in their response to fatigue; an individual’s response may also differ in relation to pre-existing conditions, accompanying stressors, workload, cumulative sleep loss, and the nature of a specific situation.
  • In objective testing, individuals often inaccurately assess their own level of sleepiness.
  • Data concerning surgeons and fatigue are limited and primarily describe physicians in training.
  • Restricted work hours for residents have not been linked to demonstrable improvements in patient safety and better outcomes or improved education of trainees.

…the overwhelming evidence is that human beings, regardless of occupation, simply cannot perform the same at night as they do during the day.

The same American Journal of Surgery published research in 2008 that concluded:

“Fatigue and sleep deprivation cause a significant deterioration in the surgical residents’ cognitive skills as measured by virtual reality simulation. Psychomotor skills are also negatively impacted during tasks that require a combination of psychomotor and cognitive skills.”

There is a dynamic in the medical community much like other communities that have  ”carved in stone” processes and schedules and want to avoid change.  That is understandable. However, the overwhelming evidence is that human beings, regardless of occupation, simply cannot perform the same at night as they do during the day. Over interpreting narrow research does not change that fact.

How fatigued employees affect your business

Updated September 28, 2020

The long-term impact of sleep deprivation on employees is real and tangible. It is estimated that sleep problems cause 13% of work injuries. An accumulation of sleep debt can lead to:

  • Less energy
  • Lower cognitive function
  • Reduced productivity
  • Decreased ability to cope with stress

The infographic below from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health demonstrates the risks that exist when employees do not get enough sleep. These risks are especially high in industries such as mining that see more worked hours, longer shifts, and increased shift work.

Hand holding a hard hat

Fatigued workers contribute to on the job errors, affecting an organization’s performance, safety and bottom line. What are you doing to address fatigue in your workforce?

Fatigue Science’s Readi™ Enterprise Suite gives workers and managers the tools to identify and reduce fatigue risks. With Readi, workers can self-manage their fatigue to build better sleep habits. An anonymized view of this data allows managers to plan high-risk work while maintaining worker privacy.

Contact a member of our sales team to learn more about reducing the fatigue risks in your workplace.

Interested in learning more about data-driven fatigue management?

or download our free eBook on the Science of Sleep for industrial workforces