Sleepy Nurses Vulnerable To Common Cold, Other Infectious Diseases

MONDAY, March 10, 2025 (HealthDay News) -- Sleep-deprived night shift nurses are at greater risk for the common cold and other infectious diseases, a new study says.

Shift work and its impact on quality sleep can wreak havoc on nurses’ immune systems, making them more vulnerable to infection, researchers report in the journal Chronobiology International.

“Sleep debt and irregular shift patterns, including night work, not only compromise nurses’ immune health but could also impact their ability to provide high-quality patient care,” senior researcher Siri Waage said in a news release. She's coordinator of the Norwegian Competence Center for Sleep Disorders at Haukeland University Hospital in Bergen.

Nurses who got up to two hours’ less sleep than they needed had a 33% higher risk of the common cold, and the risk was double among nurses with more than two hours of sleep debt, researchers said.

Their risk of pneumonia and bronchitis also increased dramatically with a lack of sleep, running nearly 2.3 times higher with moderate sleep debt and 3.9 times higher with severe sleep debt, results show.

Sinusitis and GI infections also were more common among nurses who weren’t getting enough sleep, researchers added.

For the study, researchers analyzed data from more than 1,300 Norwegian nurses.

Results showed that shift work, particularly on the night shift, was associated with higher risk of infection.

However, night shift work was solely linked to an increased risk of the common cold, not any other infections.

Hospitals and health care systems could do better by their patients by making sure nurses get adequate sleep, the researchers said.

“Nurses could benefit from optimized shift patterns, such as limiting consecutive night shifts and allowing adequate recovery time between shifts,” researcher Ståle Pallesen, a professor of clinical psychology at the University of Bergen in Norway, said in a news release.

“Raising awareness about the importance of sleep for immune health and encouraging regular health screening and vaccinations for healthcare workers may also be helpful,” he added.

More information

Yale Medicine has more on how sleep affects the immune system.

SOURCE: Taylor & Francis Group, news release, March 10, 2025