Articles Posted in Disability

I’m pretty sure Larry David had this written into the Seinfeld Parking Garage episode before making a last-minute script change to uromysitis.

I would have stuck with the former. But, Mr. David is a comedic genius and I just write this crappy blog. 

How bad is this blog, you ask? I was contemplating using the words “wicked pissah” in the lede, only to realize that I’d already used them.

Then again, you’re the ones reading this. Go ahead. Click through to read more after the jump…

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Let’s say that you have an employee whom the Americans with Disabilities Act would consider disabled and to whom you have afforded a reasonable accommodation for a long time.

Maybe it’s a few years of light duty to accommodate your employee’s bad back. Maybe it’s keeping your employee with medically-documented sleeping issues off of the graveyard shift.

Or maybe, like in this case, it’s allowing an employee who takes morning meds for ADD and bipolar disorder to arrive to work a late, so the meds can kick in. Indeed, for 2 1/2 years, the employee in this particular situation was accommodated with modified start time.

That’s how I start my next oral argument when defending a claim made under the Americans with Disabilities that one of my employer clients regarded an overweight plaintiff as disabled.

So, who wants some of what I’m drinking today?

Hey, it’s peppermint tea, jerk! And I’m not pulling this blog lede out of my butt. Well, not completely, I’m not.

Let’s assume that you run a factory in which employees are scheduled on one of two shifts: (1) 6:00 AM – 6:00 PM; or (2) 6:00 PM to 6:00 AM.

One of your employees comes to you with a doctor’s note which states that working the graveyard shift will cause the employee to suffer migraine headaches and insomnia.

The Americans with Disabilities Act requires that employers accommodate employees with disabilities if doing so will allow the employee to perform the essential functions of her job without creating undue hardship for the employer. One way in which an employer can reasonably accommodate an employee is through schedule adjustment or shift change.

That’s right folks. It’s time for another edition of “Fact or Fiction” a/k/a “Quick Answers to Quick Questions” a/k/a QATQQ f/k/a “I don’t feel like writing a long blog post.”

Let’s assume that your employee breaks his leg. Doctors tell your employee that he won’t walk normally for seven months. Without surgery, bed rest, pain medication, and physical therapy, he “likely” won’t be able to walk for more than a year after the accident.

Bottom line: The employee will heal, but it will take some time.

Sorry, Aquaman. You’re SOL, son.

But Aquaman does love to get down to MGMT, I’m told. So here you go…

Same goes for the plaintiff in this case — the telepathy part, not MGMT — in which the employer had a leave policy which dictated that employees may take up to six months of leave if unable to perform his/her job with or without reasonable accommodation. After that, it’s sayonara, unless prohibited by law, or if the employee requests a leave extension.

Let’s talk (alleged) big butts and discrimination after the jump…

(Sir Mix-a-Lot is gonna be feelin’ this post).

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You’ve got an employee with performance issues. Big time! Initially, rather than fire her, you make fun of her behind her back put her on a series of performance improvement plans. But, that doesn’t result in — oh, what’s the word I’m looking for? — improvement.

So, you fire her.

Ah, but here’s the little wrinkle for today’s post. The poor performer experienced frequent migraine headaches and struggled with pain and other symptoms caused by endometriosis. As a result of these conditions, she frequently requested medical leave under the Family Medical Leave Act, which you afforded her.

Given the poor performer’s medical issues, before firing her, did you have an obligation to engage in an interactive dialogue with her, consistent with the Americans with Disabilities Act to determine whether her health issues caused her performance issues?

The answer follows after the jump…

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