What's the main issue with the workers’ compensation, FMLA, and ADA overlap? If a worker is on leave because of a work-related injury that qualifies for workers’ compensation, the leave may also qualify as FMLA leave. Employers will generally want to designate qualified workers’ compensation leaves as FMLA leaves in order to begin exhausting the 12-week leave allotment. The work-related injury may also qualify the employee for protections under the ADA (e.g., if the injury substantially limits a major life activity), in which case, an accommodation may be needed.
Does a workers’ compensation injury always qualify for FMLA? No. In order to constitute a serious health condition under the FMLA, the injury must meet FMLA criteria (e.g., it must require continuing medical treatment for a period of 3 or more days). An employee could sustain an injury at work that required a single medical visit—for example, a minor sprain. Workers’ compensation would probably apply and cover the employee’s medical expenses but, unless the sprain were severe enough to require continued medical treatment and to require that the employee be away from work for 3 or more days, it would not qualify for FMLA.
Does a workers’ compensation injury or illness or an FMLA serious health condition necessarily constitute an ADA disability? No. An ADA disability is an impairment that “substantially limits one or more major life activities” (caring for oneself, performing manual tasks, walking, seeing, hearing, sitting, standing, bending, lifting, speaking, breathing, learning, and working). It also includes cognitive skills and the capacity to concentrate, remember, and reason, or having a record of such an impairment or being regarded as having such an impairment.
Many workers’ compensation injuries are not “disabilities” under the ADA, meaning that they may not substantially limit a worker’s ability to perform a major life activity. What does it mean that workers’ compensation and FMLA leave run concurrently? If the employer designates a workers’ compensation leave as an FMLA leave as well, it means that the normally unpaid FMLA leave will probably be paid to some degree because wage replacement will be paid by workers’ compensation. It also means that the person may not be fired for absence, even if the person is out of work beyond the employer’s cut-off absence day.
Can the employer fire the worker out on leave? Workers’ compensation: In almost all states, it is illegal to fire an employee expressly for filing for or using workers’ compensation benefits. On the other hand, employers may fire an employee out on workers’ compensation for violating a neutral and consistently enforced employee absence program or if the employee is not able to do his or her job.
A few states require that the employer make every effort to reinstate the employee to his or her former job or an equivalent job if possible. Employers should check the law in their own state.
FMLA: FMLA guarantees the employee’s right to restoration to the same job or an equivalent job when the employee returns to work. Additionally, time out on FMLA leave may not be counted as absence at all. The FMLA also prohibits employers from retaliating against employees for taking an FMLA leave. Therefore, if an employer terminates an employee during or shortly after an FMLA leave, the employer runs the risk that the termination will be perceived to be retaliatory, exposing the employer to potential liability. ADA: A qualified individual with a disability is entitled to return to the same or an equivalent position unless the employer demonstrates that holding the position open would impose an undue hardship. An employer may not apply a “no-fault” leave policy (under which employees are automatically terminated after they have been on leave for a certain period of time) to an employee with a disability who needs leave beyond the set period. Instead, the employer must modify its no-fault leave policy to provide the employee with the additional leave, unless it can show that an undue hardship would result. | 
