Abstract:

The test questionnaire of the famous Swedish scientist Ostberg and the work ability index (WAI) have been approved and widely used tools for researches. Reference data from studies of chronotype and performance index of Bulgarian workers (including health care professionals) as well as studies of the connection between them and with shift work are poorly documented or missing. The aim of the article is to explore аssociations between the chronotype, work ability index and shift work among health care professionals. A direct anonymous investigation was held among 53 health care professionals working in shifts in a multi-profile hospital for active treatment. The data was collected using the Osterg’s test questionnaire and the questionnaire for work ability index (WAI), and to gather information about the shifts work and work organization the data for hours worked by type of duty by the working schedules of hospital wards were taken. The prevailing category of chronotype is "more towards morning type". With the increasing age, the chronotype is displaced from arrhythmic to more morning type. The WAI shows a high relative proportion of healthcare professionals from the category with good performance. Overall, there is an inverse dependence - with increasing the age the index of performance decreases. It was not found a statistically significant link between chronotype and index performance (P> 0,05) and between WAI and shifts work (expressed by the average number of hours of duty of a working health care professionals) (P> 0,05 ). It was not reached statistical significance in the connection between WAI and morning shifts work, but there is a trend towards such (P = 0,059). It was found a statistically significant relationship between the chronotype and shifts work (at night 12 hour shifts (P = 0,024), with all-day 12 hour duties (P = 0,004). Although the survey results partially show that shift work and the chronotype of every person which works affect on the state of performance and they confirmed the existence of a link between the chronotype and shift work, there is a need for further researches to ensure more detailed information and an opportunity for comparison with future studies.

Keywords: Shift work; Work Ability Index; WAI; Chronotype; Health care professionals