By Alexandra Thompson Senior Health Reporter For Mailonline
Published: 10:00 BST, 20 June 2019 | Updated: 10:02 BST, 20 June 2019
View
comments
People who work long hours are almost 50 per cent more likely to suffer a stroke, research suggests.
A new study found employees who juggle a demanding 10 hour work schedule every day for at least a decade are 45 per cent more likely to develop the life-threatening condition.
And, in a result that baffled the researchers, the under 50s are more at risk of a stroke than their older colleagues.
People who work long hours are more likely to suffer a stroke, according to research
The research was carried out by Paris Hospital and led by Professor Alexis Descatha, of the occupational health unit.
Britons have been found to have the longest working days of anywhere in Europe. Full-time employees in the UK work an average of 42 hours a week, which is almost 120 minutes more than a typical EU worker.
In 2012, the researchers started analysing the hours of 143,500 French workers, of which 29 per cent reported working long hours.
This was defined as working more than 10 hours at a time for at least 50 days a year.
Around one in ten of the study's hard grafters claimed they had worked these long hours for at least a decade.
Over the next seven years, 1,224 of the volunteers suffered a stroke.
Results - published in the journal Stroke - revealed those who reported working long hours had a 29 per cent greater risk of the life-threatening condition.
And the odds rose to 45 per cent for those who had done this for 10 years or more.
This remained true even after the researchers accounted for other heart-related risk factors or any previous stroke.
Surprisingly, the participants, who were aged between 18 and 50, were more at risk of a stroke if they were younger.
'The association between 10 years of long-work hours and stroke seemed stronger for people under the age of 50,' Professor Descatha said.
'This was unexpected. Further research is needed to explore this finding.'
The team behind the study worry about the wellbeing of healthcare workers, who are typically forced to endure long shifts.
'I would also emphasise many healthcare providers work much more than the definition of long working hours and may also be at higher risk
