Brain Tumors and Work :: Medical Workforce Lesion Essays

Brain Tumors and Work Going Home after a brain tumor or lesion can be exciting, joyous, and fearful for the whole family. It can be hard to leave the security of your doctors and nurses, even though they are only a phone call away. Luckily social services can help homecoming along with the many laws protecting people with disabilities. Employment The workforce includes many individuals with psychiatric disabilities who face employment discrimination because their disabilities are stigmatized or misunderstood. Congress intended Title I of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) (1990) to combat such employment discrimination as well as the myths, fears, and stereotypes upon which it is based. The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission ("EEOC" or "Commission")(2005)receives a large number of charges under the ADA alleging employment discrimination based on psychiatric disability. These charges raise a wide array of legal issues including, for example, whether an individual has a psychiatric disability as defined by the ADA and whether an employer may ask about an individual's psychiatric disability. People with psychiatric disabilities and employers also have posed numerous questions to the EEOC about this topic. The purpose of the ADA is to: (1) provide a clear and comprehensive national mandate for the elimination of discrimination against individuals with disabilities; (2) provide a clear, strong, consistent, enforceable standard addressing discrimination against individuals with disabilities; (3) ensure that the Federal Government plays a central role in enforcing the standards established in this chapter on behalf of individuals with disabilities; and (4) invoke the sweep of congressional authority, including the power to enforce the fourteenth amendment and to regulate commerce, in order to address the major areas of discrimination faced day to day by people with disabilities. The first employment lawsuit filed under the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 (ADA) was on behalf of a brain tumor survivor. In July 1992, Charles L. Wessel, Executive Director of AIC Security Investigations, was fired with one day’s notice after telling his company he had inoperable brain metastases from lung cancer. The Chicago-based company’s owner told Mr. Wessel that his position had been eliminated. On November 5, 1992, the EEOC filed this first federal ADA â€Å"test case† with their Chicago district office. The EEOC claimed Mr. Wessel was able to perform the essential functions of his role of executive director and that his firing violated Title I of the ADA. EEOC lawyers described the case as â€Å"a classic example of the type of