WHAT TO KNOW IF YOU LOST YOUR JOB DUE TO A DISABILITY OR OTHERMEDICAL CONDITION

If you lost your job because of a medical condition, and you are considering calling alawyer to sue your employer, you need to know your medical diagnosis that caused theemployment problem. Second, you need copies of the notes you gave your employerthat described your medical condition, period of incapacity, and probable return dates. Ifyou do not have copies of these documents, you need a clear understanding of whatyou told your employer in terms of your medical condition and needs.

The failure to put your employer on notice that you have a long-term medical conditionthat may qualify as a disability may pigeon hold you into only being eligible for sick pay,FMLA, or maybe not having a legal case. Many failure to accommodate medicalcondition cases in employment law involve questions whether the medical condition is adisability, FMLA, or whether the employer got enough information that the condition wasa disability, or anything that required the employer to allow the time off.

If you have a disability and you don't tell your employer about it, you don't give them adiagnosis, and you don't tell them it's a permanent condition, they don't have to getinvolved in an interactive process to work with you to determine what you need in orderto keep your job. Reasonable accommodations are often based on the informationdiscussed in the interactive process. If insufficient information was provided to theemployer about the medical condition and its limitations, the employer may claim theyhad inadequate information to trigger a duty to accommodate.

Call (805) 200-0100 to determine if you can sue your employer due to your medicalproblem

Some employees have serious medical problems that the law may accommodate. Inthese situations, there can be legal job protection based on the medical condition theemployee suffers from. However, if it is not realistic for the employee to go back andwork the job, ever the employer does not have a duty to reasonably accommodate theemployee and hold the position open.

Many times, a workers compensation lawyer tells their client to check up with anemployment lawyer. If the employee is no longer capable of working the job due to thework injury, it would be better for the workers compensation lawyer just to say that. Inaddition, applying for permanent disability is a conflict with saying I can work withreasonable accommodations.

If the employee has not worked in years, needs major accommodations to come back tothe job, there might not be a duty on the employer's part to take the employee back.

Problems also occur if the employee comes back to work and the work makes themedical condition worse. In those cases, ADA reasonable accommodation concepts justdo not apply. Additionally, employees have to be ready, willing and able to come back towork. Disability law with employment law requires the employer to be ready, willing andable to go back to work. If the employee is not, a case for lost wages cannot belegitimately filed. Lost wages cannot be claimed if the employee is out on disability,unable to work, and not looking for work. For these reasons it is important to coordinatean employee's civil case with their worker's compensation lawyer, if they have one.

If the work injury prevents the employee from returning to their regular job, workerscompensation might be the best remedy. Employees who had a serious work accident,and are now seriously limited in their ability to perform their jobs should not scoff atobtaining a workers compensation lawyer to get them permanent disability benefitsunder the workers compensation system. If the employee can't come back to the workfor who knows how long, it's something that maybe needs to be in the worker'scompensation system and not in the civil courts.

Besides workers compensation maybe being the best or only remedy, workerscompensation lawyers are paid a smaller percent than lawyers who handle civil casesfor disability discrimination and FMLA violations. However, employees who win disabilityand FMLA cases can require the employer to pay their attorney fees.There really is too much stigma with workers compensation. Would an employee ratherget $80,000-$500,000 for their medical injury, or get a $5,000-$25,000 nuisancesettlement for a disability discrimination case out of which they get very little money dueto attorney fees and out of pocket costs?

If you call the Employment Lawyers Group at (805) 200-0100, we will guide you on thebest path considering the nature of your medical issues and your job. Only a detailedconversation can determine if you have a disability that should have beenaccommodated, you qualify for FMLA, or you really need to pursue remedies in theworkers compensation system.