Perennial Student
I'm in the process of implementing a Fatigue Risk Management System at my work place (a port company). One of the things I'm proposing is around the provision of a special leave for fatigue - if someone reports they are too fatigued to work safely, that they are paid from a special leave instead of their own sick or annual leave (to encourage reporting).
Has anyone else implemented this, or how do you manage it when someone is too fatigued?
Thank you in advance
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We implemented a “no-questions asked” policy for fatigue leave, which I like. But what I do not like is that we do not ask why the person was fatigued. We lose a great data collection opportunity. The other part I do not like is that we apply a 3-strikes you are out rule. If they call in fatigued 3 times, on the 4th time we “investigate”. These last 2 parts I am trying hard to change.
Our leave system is automated, so when our workforce needs a "fatigue" day, they go into the system and they can use a sick day, annual leave day or one of their 2 floating holidays. After they select what type of day they will be taking, they supply a reason like vacation, MD appointment, or fatigue. They also have to select whether or not coverage is needed for their shift. If it is, the system automatically goes out and fills their shift with someone who is on the "spare list". If no one is on the spare list, our Scheduler gets a message saying they have to fill the spot. At the end of the year, we tally up the reasons for leave, including how many days were taken for fatigue. No one is ever questioned about the fatigue days, just like most organizations don't question sick leave.
Every quarter, everyone (not just our shift-workers) in the organization anonymously completes our fatigue survey. It captures how often people are taking fatigue days, the sleep-wake reasons they are usually fatigued (e.g., being awake too long before starting a shift) and the contributing conditions (e.g., poor quality sleep environment of a bunkhouse, sleep disorder etc.). This survey is one of our main fatigue risk monitoring systems. We also proactively model out schedules as planned and reactively model out schedules as worked to assess fatigue risk and levels. My favourite fatigue modeling system is FAID-Q. They have a new "cloud" version of the software we are testing and we might replaced our desktop version with it….check it out here http://www.faidquantum.com.
Happy to chat more about our fatigue leave system @perennial-student, just reply to this post.
We use the KSS before and during duty to put a limit on “too fatigued”. We cut it off at 6 on the KSS. If this occurs during duty, we have a whole process built that invokes fatigue mitigation strategies until we can get the person off duty as quickly as possible. They are paid for the rest of their duty. If they score 6 or higher before duty, they cannot work at anything safety critical. If we have nothing for them to do that would be safe for a fatigued person to complete, they get the day off. We have no limit to fatigue days and they are all paid as regular days….but in return for these paid days, everyone has to contribute data that helps us understand the fatigue risk factors that made the person fatigued and the contributing organizational and personal conditions that led to the fatigue risk factors. It was a struggle at first to get people to contribute good data, and can still be, but our sleep & fatigue culture is evolving quickly so we usually now get good data and very few people taking advantage of the system.