EVALUATION OF THE WORK CONTEXT, SLEEP QUALITY AND DAYTIME SLEEPINESS OF HIGH SCHOOL TEACHERS IN THE TRAIRI REGION/RN
Working conditions; Socio and professional relations; Work organization; Sleep/wake cycle.
The work in the social and financial context goes beyond of subsistence. Teachers have a responsibility to make pupils citizens capable of recognizing and to be aware of their own role in society. However, teaching profession is related to work overload, inadequate work conditions and violence context in the school, among other problems characteristic of this profession. In addition, the presence of health problems, including those related to sleep, is increasingly common. Therefore, considering this context, the aim of this study was to evaluate the work context, sleep quality and daytime sleepiness of high school teachers of public school in the Trairi region of Rio Grande do Norte. For this purpose, it was aplied an identification questionaire; the work context avaliation scale (EACT); the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index (IQSP) and Epworth Sleepiness Scale (ESE) for 45 teachers of both sexes, aged 39.2 ± 9.2 years. The work context was evaluated as critical for the three factors of the EACT, "Working conditions", "Work organization" and "Social and professional relations", as well as most of the items related to these factors, such as precarious working conditions, uncomfortable physical environment, work rhythm, tasks executed under pressure, non-existent autonomy and communication between subordinate and leadership. In addition, 75.6% of the teachers presented bad sleep quality and 60% with low daytime sleepiness. In relation to averages of sleep quality and daytime sleepiness according to the work context evaluation, there was observed a tendency that teachers who evaluated the "socio and professional relations" factor as critical, presenting poor sleep quality in relation to those that evaluated as satisfactory. These results have great importance in the knowledge of the work context of the teacher, reinforcing the need to create spaces for discussion and possible proposals for the elaboration of policies aimed at this professional, that help in the supply of needs listed by the worker himself. Besides, it is necessary to carry out more studies that try to clarify which factors may be contributing to the poor sleep quality present in these professionals.