Work-related Ailments Industry data on call center ailments Sleeping Disorders

Sleeping Disorders
It’s difficult to imagine any industry where on an average 40% employees say they have sleeping disorders. The maximum impact is on those with less than a year of experience (48%) who are yet to acclimatize themselves to the new schedule. However, it remained significant among the other experience groups and job profiles as well. While call floor employees keep odd hours, team leaders and operational heads tend to have odder hours—often coming in early or staying back late for meetings with day time center managers or customer calls.

Eye-sight problems
The British government identifies call handlers in the call center industry has a high risk group for eye fatigue and associated problems and has specific guidelines for the industry on maintenance of its Visual Display Units (VDUs). Though IT services programmers are likely to use VDUs for longer periods of times on a tough day and are also a high risk group, they have the advantage of being able to take a break at will. Call handlers on the other hand have little freedom on that count. Staring at a monitor tends to drop blink rates and de-lubricates the eyes and can cause severe symptoms over a long period of time. With 19% of all call center employees complaining on this count, this is not a problem to be dismissed. It might be interesting at some point of time though, to see how the Indian IT services industry fares on this count.

Digestive System Related disorders
Work-related stress, uncertain hours and an environment in which food is catered for and delivered at one time for literally thousands of people—put together it isn’t difficult to see why digestive system disorders figures so high on the list. A total of 34% of all respondents had complaints on this count. In fact, in the call center industry with its peculiar profile of by and large young employees on the call floor, often stress shows up indirectly in stress driven medical complaints instead of a direct feeling of "being stressed out." In addition, even as a whole new logistics industry has grown around the call center/ BPO industry, it has its own, as yet unresolved, problems. A captive MNC center in India suddenly found a high incidence of gastroenteritis cases on its hands last year and initially brushed it off to unhygienic habits of employees. Till it found that the food being bought to the center came in large steel drums to keep it hot for its over 1000 employees for 4-5 hours. At that temperature bacteria thrive and they did—which is the greatest incidence of gastroenteritis happened among the late shift employees who came in for dinner after 10 pm. Interestingly, compared to 28% men who complained of work related digestive problems, a lot more women seem effected (50%).

Ear Problem

Anxiety, Lethargy and Depression
These are all three different facets of the same coin and are essentially stress driven emotional and psychological issues that manifest in different ways. These are also by the way, both causes and symptoms. Depression for instance, might not show up clearly as depression, but a change in food habits and sleeping disorders. Anxiety may show up in aggressive behavior at the work place while lethargy could easily be understood as poor performance. These figures are frankly just pointers for experts to take over. At this point, enough said that the Vidyasagar Institute of Mental Health (VIMHANS) at Delhi has said it gets two call center employees every week seeking professional psychiatric help and the institute has found this disturbing enough to start warning companies and the industry about the problem. Internationally, there are specific stress management programs designed for the call center industry and include things like aggression management.

Ear Problems
It used to be a rappers’ problem – people giving to wearing walkman tape recorders all the time. Now call center employees have it with a pair of head sets and ear phones almost constantly affixed to them for eight hours every day, five to six days a week. Experts say no easy solution is possible to this problem in an industry where listening is half the job and talking the other half. Internationally, there is an entire sub-culture in the medical and design professions that is focused on call center head-sets and some norms may emerge from there that might help alleviate the problem. At the moment, at 4% of all people complaining, it is not easy to say whether this is a major problem or not. But it’s a young industry and to be warned is to be armed.

Chest Related Infections
UK call center studies have shown that humidity and temperature conditions inside an enclosed workplace can lead to significant chest problems. At 4.2% of all employees complaining of chest infections this may or may not be a severe problem but may be work looking into.

Voice Loss
This sounds insignificant at 4%, but it is difficult to think of another industry where even this incidence of voice loss is likely to occur. Internationally it is recognized as a key call center ailment as a result of incessant talking on the phone. International norms suggest availability of water on the desk to keep the throat lubricated and discouragement of caffeinated drinks like tea and coffee that lead to further de-hydration.