BUSINESS
Caffeine and medication can both contribute to poor sleep, leading to fatigue.
identify signs such as yawning, this is not
sufficient for actually measuring the levels
of fatigue that employees experience, or
identifying when such levels impact their
fitness to operate.
Section 11 of the Mine Health and Safety
Act (MHSA) requires the employer to
identify hazards and assess the health and
safety risks employees may be exposed to
while at work, and then eliminate the risk, if
possible, or otherwise control or minimise
it. The purpose of the COP on fatigue
management is to set out how these risks
will be addressed.
Part of the COP refers to the fatigue
management plan that mines must
draw up so as to ‘maintain and, where
possible, enhance safety, performance and
productivity in operational settings, and
manage the risk of fatigue in the workplace’.
According to Dr Doug Potter, a fatigue
management specialist for Predictive Safety,
the fatigue levels of mineworkers can be
managed through the implementation of
procedures such as mandatory rest periods.
However, he stresses that when operations
introduce a fatigue identification and
management process, the measures must not
be punitive.
“While it is the duty of the employee to
report for duty fit to work, there are some
things that are beyond our control. Someone
might be getting insufficient sleep – or
insufficient quality of sleep – due to shift
work, or a baby at home, for example,” Potter
explains. “There are so many factors that
affect sleep quality, and we can give people
every tool in existence to deal with fatigue,
and send them to every fatigue class, but
sometimes, life is going to happen, and
we need to be ready to deal with that. If a
person knows that telling their manager
they’re fatigued means that they’ll be sent
home and have their pay docked, or that
they’ll be fired, they are not going to be
motivated to do it.”
He adds that undiagnosed medical
conditions are a common cause of ongoing
fatigue. “Often, when we come in and do
fatigue assessments, we find that there is a
medical basis of some sort – the person has
sleep apnoea, for example, or high blood
pressure, some chronic disease that's in the
background. When you identify and treat
these conditions, this can have a significant
effect on a person’s fatigue levels.”
In terms of implementing measures that
go beyond fatigue breaks, such as fatigue –
or ‘nap’ – stations, there is a general feeling
that employees will take advantage of such
facilities if they are provided. However, this
is not the case, Potter explains. If anything, it
is the opposite.
“We have actually built a complete fatigue
centre where we can measure a person’s
fatigue levels and score their alertness using
a computer software system called PRISM
– we have every tool we could possibly need
to measure and monitor fatigue,” he says.
“When we put in nine fatigue stations for
the men and four for the women – there
were between 120 and 180 people working
each shift – everybody said that the stations
would be overrun, and everyone would
abuse them. This just has not happened.
INFORM AND EDUCATE
An appropriate information, education and awareness
programme should be put in place to create awareness and educate
all employees and their families on the impact of fatigue in the
workplace, their role in managing the risks and the controls in the
workplace.
The programme should provide information and education on:
• The factors that cause fatigue.
• The signs and symptoms of fatigue.
• The risks of fatigue in the daily execution of their duties and
the factors that cause fatigue.
10 _ QUARRY SA | JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2018
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The action they can take when feeling the effects of fatigue
during their shift.
The impact of shift work, the importance of quality sleep and
good nutrition to combat the effects of shift work.
How to maintain an environment that will allow good
quality sleep.
Source: Guideline for the compilation of a mandatory code of
practice (COP) for risk-based fatigue management at
mines (2014).