Working through a chronic illness

Eve Tahmincioglu • Profile • E-mail

Rick Williams, a firefighter from Silverton, Ore., was having so much pain in his fingers that he sometimes couldn’t turn the nozzle on the fire hose, often asking coworkers to take over.

He would be discreet, not letting anyone know he couldn’t handle the job. “I would just tell them, I wanted to hold the hose and back them up,” he says. “I never stopped doing my job.”

No one suspected that Williams was actually in agony, with joint pain that made even pushing the button on a car door impossible. He was popping Ibuprofen pills as if they were candy, in denial over what he was feeling.

Finally, Williams went to a doctor in 2001 after waking up one morning on a training trip in Salt Lake City and finding he couldn’t close either of his hands.

He was diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis, a chronic illness that causes severe pain and joint-motion loss.

“I’ve been a firefighter since the mid 70s and there I was, 43, diagnosed with an auto immune disease where basically my body is attacking itself,” he says. “I was fearful for my job.”

After trying many different drugs to help with his arthritis, he found one that did the trick, and is now able to not only function in his job but is typically pain free.

At age 49, Williams is still a firefighter and plans on being just that until 2011 when he gets to retire. “My employer knows I have this but they’re okay with it mainly because I’m doing my job,” he adds.

There are 130 million people who have one or more chronic conditions in the United States today, according to Gerard Anderson, professor of Health Policy and Management at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.

There are few solid numbers on how many of workers like Williams, are staying on the job even though they suffer an ongoing illness, including arthritis, diabetes, multiple sclerosis, asthma, cardiac and cardio-vascular diseases, and even cancer.  But experts believe the numbers of individuals with such diseases in the workplace is increasing.

The aging population and the rise in the nation’s obesity rate are contributing to the growth in the numbers of individuals with chronic illnesses. But what are also driving the increase, experts say, are therapeutic advancements such as drugs and rehabilitation programs for a host of chronic diseases.

As much as three-quarters of the population with a chronic illness can be helped through disease management and continue to work, says Chris Wilhide, the director of program development and research for Nationwide Better Health, a division of insurance giant Nationwide that provides disease management programs to employers.

As a result, employees today are living and working with a host of chronic diseases that may have once meant a quick trip to the unemployment line.

“All these factors are allowing people to live more productive lives,” says Rosalind Joffe, a career coach who focuses on people with chronic illness, and the author of the forthcoming book “Keep Working, Girlfriend!  Women, work and chronic illness.”

Joffe’s overriding message: “Figure out a way to keep working.”

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