Most Americans Keep Chronic Health Conditions Hidden at Work: Poll

TUESDAY, Feb. 11, 2025 (HealthDay News) -- Chronic ills like heart disease, asthma or diabetes afflict a majority of U.S. workers, but 60% of those affected say they've kept their health issue a secret from employers, a new poll finds.

More than a third of workers battling chronic conditions also said they'd skipped a necessary medical appointment over the past year for reasons related to work.

“Workers commonly feel stigmatized by their conditions, and this can have a profound effect on both their work and their health," survey lead author Gillian SteelFisher concluded. She directs the Harvard Opinion Research Program and is a principal research scientist at Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health.

The new poll was conducted in early October of last year. It included a nationally representative sampling of 1,010 part-time and full-time working adults, all of whom were part of organizations with 50 or more employees.

A majority of those polled -- 58% -- said they had at least one form of chronic health condition, such as high blood pressure, heart disease, diabetes or asthma. 

Among this group, 76% said they needed to find the time and resources to manage their health issue during working hours, but 60% said they had never informed their boss that they had a chronic health condition.

“Though employers may think they know their employees’ needs, poll results suggest there are widespread and frequently hidden challenges facing workers with chronic conditions,” SteelFisher said in a Harvard news release.

The survey found health woes affecting workers' health and employment in many ways:

• 36% of workers with chronic conditions said they'd had to skip or delay appointments or needed care due to work issues.

• About half (49%) of these workers said they hadn't been able to take time off to deal with a medical issue or had not even been able to take work breaks to care for their health, even though they needed to.

• About 1 in 4 workers with chronic health conditions said they believed they'd been passed over for a promotion in the past year due to their health issue, and 21% said they'd gotten a bad work review or negative feedback linked to their health troubles.

All of this can harm employers as well as workers, SteelFisher said.

"To help retain employees in a tight job market, employers may want to have more conversations with employees about ways that they can make work ‘work’ for everyone," she said.

Too often, even healthy workers have someone ill at home they are caring for, the poll found. A full third of survey respondents were in this position, and almost half (45%) of this subgroup said they often had to help a sick dependent during working hours.

Despite that, 37% of people with a chronically ill family member said they'd had difficulty taking time off to help their loved one, and a quarter said they had to cut back on working hours (and income) to manage the situation.

Less than half (44%) of workers thought their current employer was supportive of them either taking break time during the day to deal with a chronic health issue or paid time off. 

Remote work often wasn't an option: Just 27% said an employer might be supportive of a work-from-home approach, and only 37% said their boss might approve some form of flexible work scheduling.

“There is a major opportunity for employers to play a greater role in supporting employees who are managing their own or their family’s chronic conditions,” said Brian Castrucci, president and CEO of the de Beaumont Foundation, which helped conduct the survey. 

“Not only will this improve the health of employees and their families, but it will also provide employers a way to distinguish themselves, as well as improve retention and reduce absenteeism.”

More information

There's more on navigating work and chronic illness at Michigan State University.

SOURCE: Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, news release, Feb. 11, 2025