Across the strongest research, the Canadian court record, and the accounts of people who have lived it, the same thing decides whether a return holds: the workplace a person comes back to, not the diagnosis they carry. Every figure traces to a primary source.
The workplace, not the clinic alone, is the deciding variable: the thesis in a single finding.
Butler, Johnson & Côté (2007), Journal of Occupational and Environmental Medicine. doi:10.1097/jom.0b013e318032211d (opens in a new tab)
The strongest evidence is for offering work accommodations. The foundational systematic review.
Franche, Cullen, Clarke, Irvin, Sinclair & Frank (2005), Journal of Occupational Rehabilitation. doi:10.1007/s10926-005-8038-8 (opens in a new tab)
High demands and low support predicted lower return rates; high job control predicted higher ones. This names the workplace levers behind the biopsychosocial model. (433 claimants.)
Krause et al. (2001), American Journal of Industrial Medicine. doi:10.1002/ajim.1112 (opens in a new tab)
The effective elements are known, which is what makes a standard possible to prescribe. (36 medium and high-quality studies.)
Cullen et al. (2017), Journal of Occupational Rehabilitation. doi:10.1007/s10926-016-9690-x (opens in a new tab)
A one-unit gain in a workplace’s psychosocial safety climate was associated with roughly 10% fewer sick days over a year, with estimated savings of USD 0.6 to 2.7 million a year for a 5,000-employee organization. The bridge from psychological safety to the disability outcome — explored in full under Psychological safety.
Loh, Dollard & Friebel (2024), The Economic and Labour Relations Review, 35(3). Read at Cambridge Core (opens in a new tab)
This is the public court record, not an attack list. We cite these rulings as evidence of why a standard is needed. Company names appear only inside the public case citations.
A building-maintenance supervisor with 30 years of service was dismissed without cause the day he returned from leave after surgery. He was awarded 24 months’ pay in lieu of notice plus aggravated damages, and the Court of Appeal confirmed aggravated damages can be awarded without medical proof of a diagnosable psychological injury. A 2024 decision, squarely at the workplace stage.
Krmpotic v. Thunder Bay Electronics Limited, 2024 ONCA 332 (opens in a new tab). $50,000, aggravated.
An employer refused a worker’s medically cleared return because he walked with a limp, and did not engage in good-faith dialogue. The tribunal found a breach and ordered management training on disability accommodation, the exact support a standard supplies.
Skedden v. ArcelorMittal Dofasco, 2019 HRTO 627 (opens in a new tab). $31,156.25 in lost wages and injury to dignity, plus ordered management training.
The lived experience of people who have moved through disability claims, held as themes: never a named, quoted, or profiled individual. These are the patterns that recur at the workplace stage.
Pressure to return before recovery, into a job with no meaningful accommodation or psychological safety, followed by re-injury or deterioration.
The employer hands the file to an insurer or administrator and goes silent, taking no role in the workplace it actually controls, the workplace that decides whether the person recovers.
The same records show a second finding: the process itself can harm. Read that, or add your name to the charter.
This page is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 (CC BY-SA 4.0) (opens in a new tab). Any worker, union, clinician, employer, insurer or practitioner may use, adapt and share it with attribution to NAPSDM, provided any adapted version carries the same licence and passes the same freedom on.
