When a person sees their doctor for a condition approved under FMLA, is the doctor required to specify that the visit is covered under FMLA on the return to work slip?
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Here is your answer from the experts at HR.BLR.com:
If the employee is seeing his or her doctor for a serious health condition already medically certified for leave, the employee (and his or her doctor) cannot be required to provide additional proof of the need for leave to see the doctor for medical treatment.
Employers may require that employees who take regular leave (but not intermittent leave) because of their own serious health condition provide medical certification before they return to work. This certification is often called “fitness-for-duty” certification.
If the “return to work slip” that is mentioned in your inquiry is a fitness for duty requirement that the employee must provide when returning to work after a period of FMLA leave, a number of requirements apply.
Fitness-for-duty certification requirements must be made as part of a “uniformly applied policy or practice” that requires all similarly situated employees who take leave for certain medical conditions to obtain fitness-for-duty certification.
In other words, the employer must require that all employees in certain occupations and with certain serious health conditions present fitness-for-duty certification in order to return to work after an FMLA leave (e.g., all airport luggage handlers with back injuries must obtain fitness-for-duty certification before returning to work).
If the employer will require a fitness-for-duty certification, the employer must notify the employee of this fact no later than the FMLA designation notice. The notice must also specify whether the fitness-for-duty certification must address the employee’s ability to perform the essential functions of the employee’s job. DOL’s Designation Notice (Form WH-382) contains a statement to this effect.
Employers need only check off the fitness-for-duty statement on theWH-382 and attach a list of essential job functions to the WH-382 to comply.