Ontario is about to change when your boss can ask you for a sick note

Legislation will soon be proposed to amend the Employment Standards Act so that employers can no longer require staff to get sick notes for the three days of sick leave provided under the law.   

But bosses could still require workers to sign an attestation they were ill or to provide a receipt for any over-the-counter medication they purchased. 

“These changes are designed to reduce the paperwork burden for sick workers and health-care professionals, while maintaining accountability in the workplace,” said a statement from the office of Labour Minister David Piccini.

Employers would still be entitled to ask for notes for any sick days beyond the minimum of three required under Ontario law. The Liberals had banned sick notes for the first 10 days of absences a year. 

The sick note change and testing the use of artificial intelligence for medical records come amid a doctor shortage that has physicians sounding the alarm they spend almost 20 hours a week on paperwork.

That is time that could be better spent seeing patients, given that 2.3 million Ontarians do not have a family doctor. 

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• Dec 31, 1969
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• Dec 31, 1969
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The changes are a “step in the right direction,” said Dr. Andrew Park, president of the Ontario Medical Association.

Liberal MPP Adil Shamji, an emergency physician who has also worked in family practice, said the government could make a bigger difference with improved programs aimed at retaining health-care workers who left the field during and since the gruelling COVID-19 pandemic.

While it makes “absolute sense” to relax sick note requirements, “tinkering around the edges with things like the AI project … is not going to solve the crisis that we face right now,” said Shamji (Don Valley East).

Health Minister Sylvia Jones said the AI program to summarize or transcribe conversations with patients is being expanded to more than 150 primary-care providers with patient consent to gauge how well the system works.

Many doctors now type notes on their conversations with patients into their computers or take handwritten notes.

“Together, these changes put patients before paperwork, allowing clinicians to spend more time with patients,” Jones said. 

New Democrat MPP France Gelinas (Nickel Belt) said sick notes in most cases are a waste of time, for both patients and for doctors or nurse practitioners.

“To me, the sick note has to go the way of the dinosaur,” she said.

There are also concerns that sick note requirements often lead patients who are contagious to get on public transit or go out in public, potentially spreading germs to others.

In other situations, they don’t go to see a doctor until they’re feeling better, taking time away from patients who need actual medical care, said Shamji.