Chronic health condition might need addressing at work
What percentage of Americans would you guess have a chronic health condition? I was surprised recently to learn that it’s 50 percent. And another 25 percent have two such conditions. Of course, the older we get, the more likely it is that we will suffer from one or more chronic health condition.
If you are retired or work from home, it might not be all that challenging to deal with your condition, depending of course on what it is and how it affects you. But for those who are required to show up in an office every day and perhaps travel on a regular basis for their jobs, having a chronic health condition can cause all sorts of problems.
These chronic conditions can be painful, both to you physically and to your bank account. You don’t want it to affect your job, of course, because that could cause even more financial discomfort and might result in losing your health insurance. So, how does an employed individual deal with a chronic health condition?
First, you should research your condition as much as possible and talk to your doctor about your current and anticipated symptoms resulting from it. If you think you can handle your condition without it jeopardizing your job, there’s no sense in making it public in the workplace.
But if you believe your condition is affecting your work or is soon to do so, conduct some research regarding your rights under the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). A consultant with the Job Accommodation Network, which is funded by the U.S. Department of Labor’s Office of Disability Employment Policy, says that most chronic conditions are well protected by the ADA.
Assuming you’re having or think you’re about to have some issues at work due to your condition, open up a dialogue about it with your immediate supervisor. There’s a better chance that you’ll be able to work out some special accommodations for yourself if you begin the conversation rather than if they see your work slipping before they are aware of the problem.
Millions of people with chronic health conditions are working to provide income for themselves and their families. By making some arrangements that help them do their job better in this challenging situation, they can usually keep working as long as they want to.
Do you have a chronic health condition that has affected your job? If so, what did you do about it and how did that work out? Our readers would love to hear about it.
unfortunately were all heading this way. As we age our body’s change and become weak and brittle. Our minds also change. As we get closer to the 50ish and beyond things affect us differently but not necessary in a good way. My suggestion is. If the company you work with has other departments where you may go to. try to get one of those other positions. Some company’s like it when you move around. but if you have to do the legal option ?? Then you have to do whatever you need for your survival. But before you do the legal way, Try to move around with in your company and try other positions, you might like it? :)
Too bad I didn’t know this years ago. I have a bad back and was forced to stand on a teller line all day. Also was not allowed to keep water at my desk. By the end of the day my back and feet were killing me so that I could barely hobble out to my car and my ankles were swollen. My doctor told me, as soon as you turn 65 I want you out of there, you’re killing yourself.
Dear Frank,
This blog of yours was short and sweet today, but spot on regarding a very important issues especially for our aging American workers!
As you know, as a high risk P.I. and consultant we have investigated many cases of discrimination, sexual harassment and ADA issues. So, we respectfully share a couple tips for your readers.
1. When you have a job you like, the sooner you put your employer on notice your condition may affect your productivity, without proactive accommodation on their part the better.
2. However, always do it IN HARD PAPER WRITING, as well as verbally and start a file of their responses. If they email regarding the issue, make print outs for the file … same thing for your answers.
3. Keep your employer up to date on your recovery or your deterioration with letters from your doctors.
HOWEVER! Sure, an employer can get in big trouble if they violate the ADA and just let you go, cut your wages or arbitrarily demote you. Still, some jobs and critical services or duties have well established and recognized “Standards of Health and Performance” that must be maintained. Of course, then a person should accept that they need to find something else to do, usually for their own life safety or the safety of others. Responsible employers will gladly reassign a valued employee in such cases, rather then let them go or kick them to the curb.
BUT, unfortunately, there are some unscrupulous employers out there!!!
Those are the jerks who will smile, nod and give you assurances they will do whatever to appease, but then begin nitpicking and setting the employ up to fail so then can fire them “for cause” avoiding ADA violations and not having to invest in any needed changes to retain the person.
When someone thinks they have covertly been put on the bosses “hit list” after notification, they should contact their state Attorney Gen. office, the state Dept. of Labor investigators or perhaps the Federal Dept. of Labor. File a formal complaint and articulate it with times, dates, details, etc. of all overt and covert employer abuses.
No matter how bad the workplace environment gets when they are trying to make you quit or find a way to fire you, don’t walk away once you have filed an official complaint. Bite the bullet and build your case maintaining a daily journal, audio recording conversations or taking videos with your I-phone of abuses, setups or harassment by the boss, supervisors or other employees covertly told to gaff you or sabotage your work. It is sad and morally wrong, but such things do happen.
We all get old and moldy eventually, but there is no reason in the world we have to dry up and blow away! Besides, older workers have a stronger work ethic, experience, wisdom and commonsense that young new hires.
God Bless,
Orin
Orin, you are the one that is spot on. I couldn’t say it any better. All to often people feel that they are entitled to know the personal business of their workers and co-workers. Instead of understanding and helping their fellow human being, the bottom line gets in the way because the person has a difficulty, medical condition, or is an element out of his or her time, they are to old. The company fears that it may somehow reflect upon them as a company or the aging employee isn’t up to company standards due to the new advances of technologies or he or she may have an illness that makes those that work around them to become self-conscious.
It is easy to label someone as to being different from themselves like as being to old to do the job, or they work to slow, or they don’t understand the new technology because they are old. But with age, comes wisdom, patience, a work ethic that has gone by the roadside according to today’s standards as we know them. For example, taking pride in doing a job right the first time, what is right for the company (loyalty). service with respect to the customer and themselves, and I can go on and on. However, with the standards changing so rapidly, we are losing the best that our aged citizens can provide.
We also need to remember, everyone needs to earn a living. Can we really afford sending people to pasture when they really don’t want to go? The cost of doing business has increased dramatically, but, the cost of the earned pensions hasn’t (if you are lucky to have one), even if you are depending on Social Security. Trust me when I say that you will starve to death if you have to depend upon Social Security.
What if you have an ailment that requires you to be dependent upon medication – just the simple stuff like blood pressure medicine, thyroid medication, heart medication and so on. It is a wonder that companies can charge a person an arm and a leg for these pills. On the average it will cost an older American anywhere from $150. 00 dollars to $500.00 dollars per month just so that they can live a somewhat normal sustainable life. Often times it gets to the point what is more important in life – pills to help your condition and ease your life or putting food on the table or a roof over your head. Only to have a younger generation trying to push you into permanent retirement. As it stands now the older generation, the Baby Boomers, are telling the generation after them, be careful because you are next in line to be shoved out to pasture. The better mouse trap you are making today will be the mouse trap that you yourselves will have to face soon enough and there is no wiggle room out of it.
For those whose job requires them to fly, inspection at boarding can REQUIRE them to throw away any thing they have found helps their condition. A man has gout, my wife give him a home remedy which looks like a brownie that worked great, stopping all his pain and he could walk easily, So he has some in his backpack going on plane to go to work, at inspection, he opened backpack for them to look, they seen brownie and told he ” you can not get on plane with those things, throw them in trash, now”. He did. That next week was very painful for him. Do you think the customer would tell his boss ” this man is having a hard time walking, this is an IT job, can he think straight ??