Parental Leave Question

[drresident8288]

I am a current PGY-3 resident in a four year program and am expecting baby number 2 with a due date of early June. I saved up 2 weeks of vacation, 2 weeks of sick leave, and 3 weeks of paid parental leave to use towards my maternity leave.

Well, this week at 20 weeks I had a cerclage placed for incompetent cervix and have been on modified bed rest for 2 weeks. My program is letting me work 3 days/week from home, so I’ve exhausted 4 of my sick days here and I’m not entirely sure what will happen from here. I was told I will have to use my sick leave, then vacation, then parental leave, then FMLA if I need extended bed rest/time off until baby is born.

My question is, if I exhausted all of sick and annual leave before baby is born, based on ACGME requirements, aren’t I still owed at least the six weeks of paid parental leave once baby is born? I don’t think they they can count my medical leave prior to baby being born as that six weeks if I have just used my vacation and sick leave for that, can they?

For example, if I need the next 5 weeks off (3 weeks of annual leave and 2 weeks of sick leave), and then I take FMLA until baby is born, I haven’t technically used my 6 weeks that ACGME mandates (and my baby hasn’t been born yet).

If I go ahead and apply for medical leave, they will make me use my vacation and sick days towards the six weeks, but if I don’t, I don’t think they can?

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[mistafab]

What are you going to do - bring a lawyer to your PD? Demand xyz and burn your bridges?

Your best bet is to work with your PD to the most flexible/useful time off scenario. Do not make enemies here when you’re under the wire. My bet is they are trying to put off your biggest block of time in case things go south so they can still cover you and keep you paid/insured.

You still have a year left so if something happens 6 months from now, having a big bank handy will be very helpful. Work with your PD, not against them. After this pgy year you get more vacation, they will want to keep those for you and not mess up your graduation time.

 

[NotAProgDirector]

You asked a similar question earlier this month here: Parental Leave Policy In the future, it's probably better to just repost to your prior thread to avoid repetition.

The ACGME policy does NOT give residents 6 weeks of paid parental leave. It gives residents 6 weeks of paid leave for any qualifying event -- of which pregnancy is one, but so is any illness, or care of an ill family member, etc. So your program must give you one 6 week leave, but they certainly could consider your current illness as qualifying for that leave.

Sounds like your program's policy is that you must exhaust all of your paid sick and vacation time first. Then they give you "the rest" of 6 weeks of paid leave per the ACGME policy. After that, it's FMLA which is unpaid, unless you're in a state that has some sort of paid FMLA option or this is something offered by your program.

What's missing in all of this is disability leave. If you have disability insurance it should cover you for pregnancy related complications. I would hope that most programs would have this for residents, but perhaps not.

Without disability insurance, you're very limited in your options. You could use FMLA now -- but that's likely unpaid. Whether you exhaust your paid leave now and then use unpaid FMLA later, vs the other way around, you'll end up in exactly the same financial spot.

 

[drresident8288]

What are you going to do - bring a lawyer to your PD? Demand xyz and burn your bridges?

Your best bet is to work with your PD to the most flexible/useful time off scenario. Do not make enemies here when you’re under the wire. My bet is they are trying to put off your biggest block of time in case things go south so they can still cover you and keep you paid/insured.

You still have a year left so if something happens 6 months from now, having a big bank handy will be very helpful. Work with your PD, not against them. After this pgy year you get more vacation, they will want to keep those for you and not mess up your graduation time.

Oh no, absolutely not. My program is working with me as much as they can and I’m not angry at all. I expect to have to make up time if I take extended leave and I’m not upset about it, just trying to figure out options. When I spoke with the GME office, they made it sound like if I had exhausted all of my leave prior to my qualifying event, I would still be able to take six weeks off, but I just wasn’t sure if this would all be considered one event if I don’t officially take my leave until I’ve used up my sick/vacation days.

I am definitely not trying to burn any bridges or make this difficult for my program in any way. Just trying to get the “fine print” so I know what I can expect to ask for.

 

[drresident8288]

You asked a similar question earlier this month here: Parental Leave Policy In the future, it's probably better to just repost to your prior thread to avoid repetition.

The ACGME policy does NOT give residents 6 weeks of paid parental leave. It gives residents 6 weeks of paid leave for any qualifying event -- of which pregnancy is one, but so is any illness, or care of an ill family member, etc. So your program must give you one 6 week leave, but they certainly could consider your current illness as qualifying for that leave.

Sounds like your program's policy is that you must exhaust all of your paid sick and vacation time first. Then they give you "the rest" of 6 weeks of paid leave per the ACGME policy. After that, it's FMLA which is unpaid, unless you're in a state that has some sort of paid FMLA option or this is something offered by your program.

What's missing in all of this is disability leave. If you have disability insurance it should cover you for pregnancy related complications. I would hope that most programs would have this for residents, but perhaps not.

Without disability insurance, you're very limited in your options. You could use FMLA now -- but that's likely unpaid. Whether you exhaust your paid leave now and then use unpaid FMLA later, vs the other way around, you'll end up in exactly the same financial spot.

Thank you for your response.

I spoke with the GME office and they made it sound as if all leave was exhausted prior to applying for your medical leave, you would still qualify for six weeks, so I was trying to get clarification on if this was how it worked for others (assuming I’m still able to partially work during some of these weeks between now and my due date and won’t already be on medical leave for 6+ weeks before then).

One of the things my program does is give you 3 weeks of parental leave (which does require birth of adoption of a child), and I can’t take that until after baby is here, so I guess I would be guaranteed 3 weeks if I were to take 6 weeks of purely medical leave for myself prior to that.

Hoping baby stays put until full term and I don’t have to worry about this as much. My program has been great about working with me thus far and I’m definitely not trying to burn any bridges or make anything difficult for anyone, more so just try to see how this has worked for others.