Disability: genuinely curious

Published

Specializes in Cardiac, Home Health, Primary Care.

So venting a little but also curious.

When people talk about needing disability because their knee/back/hip hurts when they stand do they not know there are jobs that don't require much standing besides going to the bathroom?

When some say they need it for anxiety yet are able to go party on the weekends? (Don't get me wrong I have anxiety myself but I have also worked since I was 16).

Do some people feel entitled? Not think? Think they don't need to help themselves and lose weight to ease the stress on their joints?

Again kind of a rant but also a little curious if there's a side I'm not seeing.

And I grew up poor with food stamps and hand me downs from friends of the family and Medicaid. I know what it means to need help.

Up Vote Up Vote ×

Sore topic on my unit.

Those jobs that don't involve standing for long periods in my system are reserved for those with a documented disability and are deemed an accommodation or require so much seniority that most staff don't have a chance in hades of getting it.

Up Vote Up Vote ×
Specializes in Cardiac, Home Health, Primary Care.
Sore topic on my unit.

Those jobs that don't involve standing for long periods in my system are reserved for those with a documented disability and are deemed an accommodation or require so much seniority that most staff don't have a chance in hades of getting it.

I can see where that would be a sore topic on a unit. I am in an outpatient clinic so wonder more about the general public than nurses.

I know we can't do much about some of our aches and pains until we get some good ratios. Even then though....

Up Vote Up Vote ×

In my system the staff who are "duty to accommodate" are meant to be invisible on the units, as in we are not meant to know of their "disability".

But we know who most of them are because they tell us! One was an accommodation to day shift only because her vision wasn't great for driving at night. Another had a back injury from an MVA about 15 years ago, yet she is always trying to do patient transfers. Mental health issues from bullying, got one of those as well.

Some units become, for lack of a better word, dumping grounds for these staff members. It destroys unit morale. I've worked a shift where out of ten on the floor only two of us where fully able to boost a patient in bed.

We were talking about this at work today, when should a nurse know they are physically or mentally not able to perform as a nurse and perhaps leave the profession?

Up Vote Up Vote ×
Specializes in Cardiac, Home Health, Primary Care.
In my system the staff who are "duty to accommodate" are meant to be invisible on the units, as in we are not meant to know of their "disability".

But we know who most of them are because they tell us! One was an accommodation to day shift only because her vision wasn't great for driving at night. Another had a back injury from an MVA about 15 years ago, yet she is always trying to do patient transfers. Mental health issues from bullying, got one of those as well.

Some units become, for lack of a better word, dumping grounds for these staff members. It destroys unit morale. I've worked a shift where out of ten on the floor only two of us where fully able to boost a patient in bed.

We were talking about this at work today, when should a nurse know they are physically or mentally not able to perform as a nurse and perhaps leave the profession?

Would they not be more suited for case management or a clinic setting?? Heavy lifting in these areas is rare. I think I'd find a job that suited me rather than get special privileges but maybe that's just me.

Up Vote Up Vote ×
Specializes in Infusion Nursing, Home Health Infusion.

You can get special accommodations because you have been bullied?...WOW? Could it be that it includes not having to work with someone. I have had a male nurse that has been after me for years....not sure why...I think it's a pathological professional jealousy...others think he is attracted to me. He will do anything to try and get me trouble and make me miserable and that includes lying and stirring up trouble behind my back. I have actually grown to despise this person!

Up Vote Up Vote ×
Specializes in Post Anesthesia.

We pay into social security for our entire working life. We work a job with one of the highest incidents of back/spine injury in the working world. We then end up with a choice when we have the back/knees of a 80y/o at 60- apply for disability or cripple ourselves trying to get a few more mos out of a body that is worn out. After 30 years in the floor doing pt care- I don't think I can learn to do QI or Case Management or some other accomodating position. Most of the time just sitting at a desk fopr 4 hours is enough to send me ODing on Motrin and Benadryl and heading for bed. You are 23y/o with no work history and a proclivity for clubbing on the weekends till you black out because you self medicate with alcohol and pot to treat your social anxiety disorder...Blech! 60 y/o nurse that has to have the NA tie her shoes because she can't get down that far- yep, you deserve a break today- and for the rest of your life.

Up Vote Up Vote ×
Specializes in Surgical, quality,management.
Would they not be more suited for case management or a clinic setting?? Heavy lifting in these areas is rare. I think I'd find a job that suited me rather than get special privileges but maybe that's just me.

They may not have the skill set , ability or intention to devlop themselves. I had a staff member on a return to work program, unable to meet the requirements, unwilling to develop herself.

Up Vote Up Vote ×
Specializes in ICU, LTACH, Internal Medicine.

I was once in place which tried to accomodate quite a few of VERY long-term floor nurses who just could not do it all any more, many (if not all if them) due to accumulated health care issues and inability to develop new skills right away to care for more acure patients, to "bedside quality control" and charge them with one "problem" per person. I think the hope was to make some of them, with time, into QA, but for a time being it was utter disaster. Every single one of them had to "visit" every unit in place at least every other day and watch as a hawk for a single aspect of care which they now perceived as their strictly private property. Hysterics because of asymptomatic "significant event" of CBG of 69, calls to docs in the middle of the night because patient already on heparin AND argatroban did not received ASA, and to get b-blocker "as per policy" for a guy with complete heart block made life a nightmare for everyone.

I think it is important for every nurse to have an opportunity to try the hand on different areas whenever possible. Where I work now, nurses are encouraged to try case management, ID control and other things as they like and needs arose, and those who have to move out of bedside for whatever reason at least can get an idea of what they want and can to do next.

Up Vote Up Vote ×
Specializes in Healthcare risk management and liability.

In my ambulatory clinics, we see a ton of people trying to qualify for disability. In many cases, disability has become the new welfare. In some jurisdictions, the state government actively pushes for welfare clients to be declared disabled, since that removes them from the state welfare budget and transfers them to the Federal Social Security disability budget. There are healthcare and legal providers who make a tidy living from getting people declared disabled.

Up Vote Up Vote ×
Specializes in Dialysis.
Would they not be more suited for case management or a clinic setting?? Heavy lifting in these areas is rare. I think I'd find a job that suited me rather than get special privileges but maybe that's just me.

There are only so many of these jobs available, and most require some time working the floor for a certain length of time

Up Vote Up Vote ×
Specializes in Healthcare risk management and liability.

Many of the findings in the NPR article are consistent with what I see in my clinics. Especially for people with minimal education, or the plant closes and they need retraining, or they have a job-related injury, disability is the new welfare. I rarely see professional, managerial, technical or healthcare people putting in for Federal disability.

http://apps.npr.org/unfit-for-work/

From the article:

But disability has also become a de facto welfare program for people without a lot of education or job skills. But it wasn't supposed to serve this purpose; it's not a retraining program designed to get people back onto their feet. Once people go onto disability, they almost never go back to work. Fewer than 1 percent of those who were on the federal program for disabled workers at the beginning of 2011 have returned to the workforce since then, one economist told me.

People who leave the workforce and go on disability qualify for Medicare, the government health care program that also covers the elderly. They also get disability payments from the government of about $13,000 a year. This isn't great. But if your alternative is a minimum wage job that will pay you at most $15,000 a year, and probably does not include health insurance, disability may be a better option.

Up Vote Up Vote ×
+ Join the Discussion