Hi, I'm Lisa Emrich; RA Patient Advocate living with rheumatoid arthritis and multiple sclerosis. I'm here today to talk about how to manage work with RA.
First off, you will need to evaluate your needs. What are the situations that may be causing difficulties at work; maybe you have an unsympathetic supervisor. You need to figure out what you need before you can figure out what to ask for in adaptations.
Seek help from an Occupational Therapist.They could really help evaluate your workspace and see what you may need as far as different equipment or help provide recommendations on how you can more efficiently work through your jobs or do your tasks.
And then go ergonomic. There are adjustable chairs, tables, seats, keyboards all sorts of equipment that can help better support your body so your knees, hips or shoulders are in better position. The keyboards or special mouse can help with your wrist and your hands.
During the day, stay flexible and mobile. Make sure that you get up at least once every hour to walk around. Really stretch your joints and keep moving. Move your hands, move your knees, it tends to get stiff when you have RA; so you need to try to limit your stiffness.
Pace yourself. Give yourself time to finish your jobs. You may need more time than you did before you developed RA. Sometimes in the morning it’s hard to get up and get going, it takes a long time with stiffness. Ask about flex time at work. Perhaps they could give you a little bit more time to take a warm shower, take your time, let your drugs really start to take effect so that you can get on on your workday. A lot of employer are happy to accommodate when you have little request like that.
And then take care of yourself. Make sure you are exercising regularly to help keep those joints mobile. Eat well, get lots of rest; practice joint protection techniques. And when there comes a time that it becomes too difficult really to stay in the workplace and you're talking with your rheumatologist about short-term disability or long-term disability consider all your options. And when you do apply for Social Security disability insurance, seek guidance from a specialist who can help you with your application, so that you can get approved the first time.
And that’s how I see it as an RA Patient Advocate. But I do recommend that you do reach out to your doctor for more details or go to Google and type in Rheumatoid Arthritis in the workplacefor more information. Thanks for watching.
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