Co-designed resources to improve sleep health in young shiftworkers: a qualitative study

Shiftwork contributes to poor sleep and circadian disruption, leading to adverse health outcomes. With a high number of young adults (18-25 years) engaging in shiftwork, exposure to these health challenges can occur from early adulthood. Therefore, there is an urgent need for age- and career-stage-appropriate resources focused on sleep health to mitigate poor health outcomes as early as possible. Given the absence of such resources, this study aimed to develop tailored, evidence-based sleep health materials for young shiftworkers.

A participatory approach was employed, with co-designers (n = 48) attending 1-2 online workshops to develop sleep health resources for young shiftworkers. Co-designers included young, experienced, and previous shiftworkers, workplace health and safety experts, and science communications specialists, who worked alongside academic experts. Workshops explored which sleep health topics co-designers believe are important for young shiftworkers. Reflexive thematic analysis of workshop transcripts identified key themes, which were aligned with current scientific evidence, forming both the structure and content of the resulting sleep health resources for young shiftworkers.

Analysis of workshop transcripts identified five themes: sleep science, impacts of poor sleep, habits impacting sleep, strategies to improve sleep, and recommendations for workplaces. Themes were populated with evidence-based information to develop a website, a pictorial infographic, an animated video, and a social media presence.

Tailored, evidence-based sleep health resources for young shiftworkers were co-designed, with qualitative data elucidating individual and work-related sleep health themes. Future studies should evaluate the resources to determine their impact on knowledge and behaviour.