Sleep Deprivation While Driving: A case study of Truckdrivers
Have you ever taken a long trip and gotten so tired you could barely function? Loads of people go through Sleep Deprivation While Driving especially truck drivers.
Specifically for truckers, do you find that you simply do not get enough sleep, which can lead to even more problems down the road? People who drive frequently, such as business people and truckers, have more problems with sleep disorders than the majority of the people in the world.
The reason for this is that they are often under pressure to reach a specific point in a highly specific time frame. This could lead to pushing themselves to keep going, whether they are extremely tired or not.
Doing this is dangerous for many reasons. The first and probably most dangerous is the fact that people who drive with sleep deprivation or disorders are putting not only their own lives at risk, but the lives of others as well. When overly tired, you run the risk of falling asleep at the wheel. This could lead to an accident, which could result in death, bodily injury,and/ or property damage.
The Facts About Truckers
Did you know that around 14% or at least one in ten truckers drive on less than five hours of sleep each day? If it is not surprising, it should be. This means that of every ten truck drivers on the road, one of them has had less than five hours of sleep. This means the possibility of an accident, falling asleep on the road, or losing concentration increases dramatically.
On top of this, around 28% of all truck drivers suffer from a mild form of sleep apnea and around 5% suffer from a severe form of the sleep disorder. Sleep apnea is a sleep disorder in which the sufferer actually stops breathing for a short time in their sleep. In the mild form, most will stop breathing from five to fifteen times during the course of their sleep time. In severe cases, the person suffering from the sleep disorder will stop breathing a minimum of thirty times during sleep.
How Do Sleep Disorders or Sleep Deprivation Affect A Driver?
When a person, regardless of whether they are an over the road truck driver or a person simply traveling for business or pleasure, when one suffers from sleep deprivation or sleep disorder, there is a great impact on the person’s ability to drive.
You see, with either one of these conditions, a person is most likely to be sleepier during the day. At the same time, they are more apt to also fall asleep at times that are both unexpected and inappropriate. In some cases, the person may not even know that they are sleepy and without knowing this, they tend to fall asleep when not expecting it
