It is the employer, not the doctor, that decides whether or not to grant FMLA leave. Use a form where you make the doctor actually tell you what are the facts that establish the existence of a serious health condition.

Not just saying chronic migraine, tell me what that means. Tell me why the employee can’t work, why they can’t do their job. The more information the better; and, once again, if we’re uncertain about whether a leave is appropriate, then let’s consider second opinions and third opinions. By the way, these second and third opinions are not just when we are dealing with an employee’s own serious health condition but also when they’re seeking a leave for the serious health condition of a family member which requires FMLA leave. If you have reason to doubt those certifications, you can also require the same type of certification.

You have got to be willing to do what it takes to track these leaves and make sure, by the way, that you are not overlooking crediting leave when leave should be taken. Many employers, for example, don’t credit or charge FMLA leave when someone is off on Worker’s Compensation. They tend to forget about it. Worker’s Compensation, if it results in a serious health condition or incapacitation or treatment which it almost always does, runs concurrently with FMLA leave.

We have the right as employers to ask for this information.

We should ask for it and we should continue to ask for the type of information until we are actually satisfied. In the event that we get documentation from a health care provider that we believe needs some clarification or is not necessarily what we are looking for, the courts have pretty much said that, we are required as an employer to give the employee an opportunity to correct it and get us a good form. The first time we see a form where the doctor says:chronic, I don’t know how long, I don’t know how many days-that alone should not be basis to deny the leave.  That should provide us an opportunity for us to get more information. If we don’t ultimately get the information, then we’re talking about a different situation. We do need to give the employee the opportunity to correct deficient medical certification.