Episodic Disabilities List: this list is ever-changing and expanding
Anxiety • Arthritis • Asthma • Bi-polar Disorder • Cancer • Chronic Inflammatory Demyelinating Polyneuropathy (CIDP) • Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (including chronic bronchitis and emphysema) • Chronic Pain • Crohn’s Disease & Ulcerative Colitis • Cystic Fibrosis • Depression • Diabetes • ALS • Guillain-Barre Syndrome • Epilepsy • Fibromyalgia • Hepatitis B & C • HIV/AIDS • Long-COVID • Long-Term Pain • Lupus • ME/CFS • Meniere’s Disease • Migraines • Multiple Sclerosis • Muscular Dystrophy • Parkinson’s Disease • Post-traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) • POTS (Postural Orthostatic Tachycardia Syndrome) • Repetitive Strain Injury • Schizophrenia • Substance Use Disorder • Tuberculosis
Increasing numbers of Canadians are living with episodic disabilities. A person can simultaneously live with both permanent and episodic disabilities; however, there are clear distinctions. An episodic disability is marked by fluctuating periods and degrees of wellness and disability. In addition, these periods of wellness and disability are unpredictable. As a consequence, a person may move in and out of the labour force in an unpredictable manner.
What are some of the challenges of living with episodic disabilities?
Definitions: Definitions used in legislation, by medical and rehabilitation providers and by insurance providers and government benefit programs often focus on permanent disabilities. They can also differ from one source to another creating barriers to accessing and coordinating programs and benefits for people with episodic disabilities who need access to various income support programs.
Care, Treatment and Support: The health care system and service providers are often not well equipped to handle the needs of people living with lifelong episodic disabilities. The unpredictability of the illness can be challenging to the care provider and a person’s self-esteem. Goals are difficult to set. Depression is common. Care and treatment can be compromised when it is dependent upon income-support and benefits programs that are not flexible.
Workplace Accommodation / Employment Issues: Part-time work and flextime are critical components. Employer associations, insurance industry representatives, governments, unions and disabilities communities need to coordinate, collaborate and contribute to plans that accommodate the needs of those living with episodic disabilities.
Income Support and Security: The threat that disabilities benefits may be “cut off” during periods of improved health, then be difficult to reinstate later during periods when health status declines may create fear of loss of benefits and non-reinstatement, and be a disincentive to return to work. In addition, complicated claim procedures may need to be repeated every time someone needs to be absent from the workforce for a period of time that is more than allowed. For these reasons, flexibility is very important in an income support program that is going to address episodic disabilities.
Legislation and Policy: Legislation needs to be barrier-free for people with episodic disabilities. Trial periods, automatic reinstatement of benefits, part-time work and job sharing, and benefit coverage while earning an income are all features of a flexible and comprehensive set of policies.
Education: Greater awareness is needed for people living with an episodic illness, for their caregivers, for care providers, for employers, for insurance companies and funders and for policy makers.
Need more information? For information on episodic disabilities, please contact: melissae@realizecanada.org.
“My patient is feeling better right now, and would like to return to work… If he does return, however, he will be cut off from his long-term disability benefits. [Consequently] he has decided not to return to work because the fear is too great… I think return to work would help his self-esteem – he has suffered from depression – if going back to work doesn’t work out, there’s a real sense of failure.”
Dr David W. Grossman College of Family Physicians of Canada From ‘Looking Beyond the Silo’, May 2002
What is Episodic Disability Resources
IDEAL Community Consultations
Intersectionality, episodic disability and access to health services, community supports and employment in Canada
Throughout 2023, Realize worked with twelve national organizations serving people living with episodic disabilities to lead focused consultations within their respective communities. The focus was an intersectional examination into the living realities and various aspects of access barriers to health services, community-based organizations and employment for people living with episodic disabilities in the Canadian landscape. The participating organizations serve communities that provided unique intersectional considerations of gender, racial identity, faith community, health conditions, sexual identity, and age with disability.
(Partner organizations involved: Alliance for South Asian AIDS Prevention, Ase Community Foundation for Black Canadians with Disabilities, Asian Community AIDS Services, Canadian Multicultural Disability Centre Inc., CanAge, Communities, Alliances, And Networks, DisAbled Women’s Network of Canada Disability Empowerment Equity Network Support Services, Live Educate Transform Society, National Educational Association of Disabled Students, Pride at Work Canada, and YouthCO.)
The objectives of this initiative were:
- To address the deficit of research on living with episodic disabilities through a disability-justice lens, led by people living with disabilities.
- To examine the realities that diverse disability communities are navigating.
- To better understand diversity in disability culture among subgroups such as youth, Muslims, 2SLGBTQIA+ folks and others.
- To broaden perspectives on people living with episodic disabilities and work.
- To examine access to and experience of health services and/or community-based organizations by diverse community members who are living with episodic disabilities.
- To increase the capacity of employers to respond effectively to the challenges facing people living with episodic disabilities and provide appropriate accommodations.
This Executive Summary includes key findings, a summary of insights, and links to each of the 12 partner reports.
Workplaces REVAMPED Final Report
This is the final report of the Realize project titled ‘REVAMPED’, Workplaces REcognizing the VAlue of eMPloyees with Episodic Disabilities funded by the Opportunities Fund of Employment and Social Development Canada.
The REVAMPED Project Objectives were targeted:
1. To increase awareness of episodic disabilities among employers;
2. To increase the understanding of employers of the challenges related to working and
living with episodic disabilities;
3. To increase the capacity of employers to respond effectively to the challenges facing
people living with episodic disabilities;
4. To increase access to information and networking opportunities for small, medium and
large employers on leading practices in accommodating employees living with episodic
disabilities in the workplace; and
5. To increase the capacity of people living with episodic disabilities to communicate
effectively about their lived experience.
The Pandemic Pandora’s Box: Long COVID and Episodic Disability
Project Report; Realize 2021
Executive Summary
The Pandemic Pandora’s Box report analyzes the combined findings of two informal, community-driven surveys shared openly online in February 2021. The first asked adults working or seeking work in Canada about their experiences with Long COVID, while the second asked Canadian employers about their comfort level and preparedness to provide workplace accommodations to COVID-19 long-haulers. Up to 1 in 3 people who contract COVID-19 – regardless of the severity of their acute infection – risk facing Long COVID. Long COVID refers to a multitude of fluctuating, debilitating symptoms that may affect all organ systems and for many cause impairments which last for months.