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Full-Text Articles in Disability Law
A Female Disease: The Unintentional Gendering Of Fibromyalgia Social Security Claims, Dara Purvis
A Female Disease: The Unintentional Gendering Of Fibromyalgia Social Security Claims, Dara Purvis
Journal Articles
Social Security disability claims are not supposed to be decided based on the gender of the applicant. Reliance on the apparently neutral mechanism of clinical medical evidence, however, has a disproportionate impact on women bringing disability claims based on fibromyalgia. Recognizing and identifying disability has been delegated by Congress and the Social Security Administration almost entirely to physicians, based upon a misguided and mistaken belief that clinical medical evidence evaluated by a trained physician will answer with certainty whether an individual claimant is capable of working. Fibromyalgia, a diffuse syndrome characterized by excess pain that is overwhelmingly diagnosed in women …
Pregnancy As 'Disability' And The Amended Americans With Disabilities Act, Jeannette Cox
Pregnancy As 'Disability' And The Amended Americans With Disabilities Act, Jeannette Cox
School of Law Faculty Publications
The recent expansion of the Americans with Disabilities Act’s (ADA) protected class invites reexamination of the assumption that pregnant workers may not use the ADA to obtain workplace accommodations. The ADA’s scope now includes persons with minor temporary physical limitations comparable to pregnancy’s physical effects. Accordingly, the primary remaining justification for concluding that pregnant workers may not obtain ADA accommodations is that pregnancy is a physically healthy condition rather than a physiological defect. Drawing on the social model of disability, this Article challenges the assumption that medical diagnosis of “defect” must be a prerequisite to disability accommodation eligibility. The social …