Disclosure, Privacy and Workplace Accommodation of Episodic Disabilities: Organizational Perspectives on Disability Communication-Support Processes to Sustain Employment.
Monique A M Gignac, Julie Bowring, Arif Jetha and 11 others
PMID 32410153WHAT IT FOUND
Workplace support staff often label episodic disabilities as performance issues when symptoms are invisible or unpredictable.
They struggle to balance privacy laws with the need for health information, leaving supervisors and co-workers excluded from accommodation plans and creating interpersonal tension.
Key findings
01Participants frequently saw disability support as a performance or attendance problem, especially when workers did not disclose their condition or when symptoms were invisible.
02Organizations struggle to balance privacy legislation with the practical need for health information to provide support, often excluding supervisors from accommodation plans to protect privacy.
03Support processes are complicated by misgivings about the skills and training of key stakeholders, including supervisors, co-workers, and health professionals.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for OTs
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What it does not show
The study used purposive sampling, which may not represent all workplace perspectives. Participants generally did not discuss demographic factors like gender, age, or education, so the study cannot speak to how these influence support processes. The findings are based on self-reported experiences and perceptions, which may be influenced by the participants' desire to present their organizations in a certain light. The study did not include the perspectives of the workers with episodic disabilities themselves, except for the five participants who also lived with a condition.
Declared interests
The study was funded by the Canadian Institutes of Health Research and the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada. No other conflicts of interest were reported.
The easy way to misread this
Do not interpret the themes as evidence that current workplace practices are effective. The paper reports on the perspectives and challenges of support staff, not on outcomes for workers. The finding that disability is often cast as a performance problem is a reported barrier, not a recommended strategy.