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TRUCKERS' HEALTH * USA - Heavy, drowsy truckers pose risk on the road
Scientists call for apnea screening; industry says weight isn't only factor
Phoenix,AZ,USA -MSNBC, by JoNel Aleccia -3 June 2009: -- Truck driver Kenneth Armstrong is a big guy with a bigger problem. At age 55, he stands 5-foot-11 and weighs 308 pounds, which doctors say helps to explain why he’s been diagnosed with severe obstructive sleep apnea, a dangerous disorder that puts him at high risk for health problems — and falling asleep at the wheel... Fortunately for Armstrong — and the people on the road around him — his employer Swift Transportation Corp. of Phoenix is one of a small but growing number of trucking firms that voluntarily screen drivers at risk for sleep apnea and then pay to treat and monitor them for the potentially life-threatening condition... Armstrong, for instance, wears a mask hooked to a machine that inflates his airways and restores his oxygen levels every night as he sleeps in his rig... But that’s the exception, not the rule, according to sleep scientists at Harvard University, who have renewed a call for federal rules requiring mandatory testing of obese drivers. They say research shows there’s a strong link between fat drivers and sleep apnea and that screening could help prevent truck crashes that kill more than 5,200 people and injure more than 100,000 each year in the U.S.... (Photo by Mike Roemer - Schneider National Inc. of Green Bay, Wis., screens its 15,000 drivers for sleep apnea, which can cause truckers to fall asleep at the wheel. Here, Schneider driver Charlie Resch demonstrates the CPAP breathing machine he wears in his truck at night to correct the condition)Labels: truckers health
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