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Clinician Referrals for FMLA, Disability & Workplace Evaluations
Keep Treating Your Patient. Refer the Disability or Workplace Evaluation.
Your patient may need FMLA paperwork, short-term disability documentation, paid-leave certification, or a workplace accommodation evaluation—but completing employment-related evaluations may not be part of your clinical role or practice.
Amica Clinical Consulting provides psychological evaluations for workplace leave, disability, and accommodation needs when a treating clinician does not provide these services or when additional assessment is needed.
Your patient can continue treatment with you.
The purpose of the referral is to address the specific evaluation and documentation need—not to replace an established therapist, psychiatrist, psychiatric nurse practitioner, primary care provider, or other treating clinician.
View Patient Evaluation Options
When a Referral to Amica May Be Helpful
Consider referring a patient when:
Your practice does not complete FMLA, short-term disability, paid-leave, or workplace accommodation documentation.
You prefer to remain in the treatment role rather than provide an employment- or disability-focused evaluation.
You recently began treating the patient and need more clinical information before making a leave, disability, or accommodation recommendation.
The patient's insurer, employer, HR department, or leave administrator is requesting detailed information about symptoms, functional impairment, work capacity, restrictions, limitations, or treatment needs.
The patient's existing documentation was returned, questioned, or considered incomplete.
Additional diagnostic clarification or psychological assessment may be useful.
The clinical question requires more detailed evaluation of occupational functioning or work capacity than is typically addressed during routine psychotherapy or medication-management visits.
Your employer, group practice, health system, or telehealth platform restricts employment- or disability-related paperwork.
Referral does not imply that leave, disability, or a particular accommodation will be recommended. All conclusions and documentation are based on the findings of the evaluation.
Evaluation Services Available for Referral
FMLA Mental Health Evaluations
For patients seeking job-protected leave because mental health symptoms are affecting their ability to work.
Evaluations may address:
Continuous FMLA leave
Intermittent FMLA leave
FMLA documentation when clinically supported
Short-Term Disability & Paid-Leave Evaluations
Specialized psychological evaluations for patients seeking wage-replacement or disability benefits because a mental health condition is significantly interfering with their ability to work (includes FMLA evaluation)
Evaluations may include:
Diagnostic assessment or clarification
Assessment of symptom severity
Detailed functional impairment assessment
Review of job demands
Work-capacity assessment
Psychological testing when clinically warranted
Treatment and recovery recommendations
Return-to-work considerations when appropriate
Disability-focused documentation when clinically supported
Learn About Short-Term Disability/Paid Leave Evaluations
Workplace Accommodation Evaluations
For patients requesting mental-health-related workplace accommodations when a focused evaluation of symptoms, functional limitations, job demands, and clinically appropriate accommodations is needed.
Learn About Workplace Accommodation Evaluations
How the Referral Process Works
1. Share the Amica Referral Resource With Your Patient
You do not need to send patient information to Amica simply to make a referral. The patient can review the service, fees, evaluation process, and scheduling information directly. If they are not sure what type of assessment/testing they need, they can also select from an initial consultation visit.
Learn About Initial Consultations
Learn About Short-Term Disability/Paid Leave Evaluations
Learn About Workplace Accommodation Evaluations
2. The Patient Contacts or Schedules With Amica
The patient completes Amica's secure intake process and provides the forms, records, job information, or other documentation relevant to the requested evaluation.
3. Amica Conducts an Evaluation
A licensed psychologist evaluates the clinical questions relevant to the requested service. Recommendations are not predetermined by the patient's requested leave, disability benefit, or accommodation.
4. Documentation Is Completed When Clinically Supported
When supported by the evaluation findings, appropriate documentation is provided to the patient through the secure patient portal. The patient maintains control over submission of the documentation to an employer, insurer, HR department, leave administrator, or other third party.
5. You Remain the Treating Clinician
Referral to Amica does not require transferring the patient's ongoing mental health care. Patients may continue psychotherapy, medication management, primary care, or other established treatment with their existing providers.
When coordination with a treating clinician would be clinically helpful, communication may occur with the patient's appropriate authorization.
You Do Not Need to Transfer the Treatment Relationship
Clinicians sometimes hesitate to refer a patient for an outside evaluation because they do not want to disrupt an established therapeutic relationship.
Amica's workplace evaluation services are designed to address a specific assessment and documentation question.
They are not intended to replace ongoing treatment.
A patient may:
Continue therapy with you
while Amica evaluates an FMLA, disability, or accommodation request.
Continue medication management with their psychiatrist or psychiatric provider
while Amica completes a psychological evaluation.
Return to your care after the evaluation
with treatment recommendations or additional clinical information when appropriate and authorized.
This separation can allow the treating clinician to remain focused on treatment while the occupational evaluation is addressed through a dedicated assessment process.
Why Clinicians Refer Employment & Disability Evaluations
Treatment and occupational evaluation overlap, but they are not identical clinical tasks.
A treating clinician may know a patient extremely well while still deciding that a particular documentation request requires additional assessment.
Employment and disability forms may ask questions such as:
How are symptoms affecting occupational functioning?
What specific functional limitations are present?
Can the patient currently perform essential job duties?
Can the patient sustain a normal work schedule?
What restrictions or limitations are clinically supported?
Is continuous or intermittent leave appropriate?
How long might impairment reasonably be expected to continue?
What treatment is recommended during leave?
When might return to work be clinically appropriate?
What clinical findings support the recommendation?
Some treating clinicians are comfortable answering these questions themselves.
Others prefer to refer the evaluation while continuing to provide treatment.
Both approaches can be clinically appropriate depending on the circumstances, the clinician's role, available information, practice policies, and the specific documentation request.
What Amica Does — and Does Not — Provide
Amica Provides
Psychological evaluation
Assessment of mental health symptoms
Functional impairment assessment
Occupationally relevant assessment
Psychological testing when clinically warranted
Treatment recommendations
Leave, disability, or accommodation recommendations when clinically supported
Documentation related to the specific evaluation when supported by the findings
Amica Does Not Provide
Guaranteed FMLA certification
Guaranteed disability approval
Predetermined accommodation recommendations
Legal advice
Employment-law determinations
Decisions regarding employer eligibility requirements
Decisions regarding insurance-plan eligibility
Routine form signing without an appropriate clinical evaluation
Employers, insurers, leave administrators, state programs, and other benefits administrators make their own eligibility and approval decisions.
A Simple Referral Message You Can Share With Your Patient
If your practice does not complete employment- or disability-related evaluations, you are welcome to copy and share the following:
“If you need an evaluation for FMLA, short-term disability, paid leave, or workplace accommodation documentation, Amica Clinical Consulting PLLC provides telehealth evaluations with a licensed psychologist. You can review the available services, fees, and scheduling information directly through Amica. This is a separate evaluation service, and you may continue treatment with your current healthcare providers.”
You may wish to bookmark the link below:
For Group Practices, Clinics & Clinical Teams
If your practice routinely receives requests for:
FMLA forms
Short-term disability paperwork
Paid-leave certification
Workplace accommodation documentation
Return-to-work documentation
Clarification requests from disability or leave administrators
you may save Amica as an outside evaluation resource for situations in which your clinicians do not provide these services.
There is no requirement to establish a formal referral relationship.
Your clinicians can simply provide the Amica resource link to patients when an independent evaluation may be appropriate.
Clinical Collaboration & Patient Privacy
Amica respects the distinction between treatment and independent evaluation.
Clinicians do not need to send protected health information simply to direct a patient to Amica.
If clinical records or communication with a treating provider would be useful to the evaluation, that information can be requested or shared through appropriate secure processes and with any necessary patient authorization.
Please do not send patient-identifying clinical information through ordinary email or unsecured referral messages.
Peer Consultation Is Also Available
Sometimes you may not need to refer the evaluation.
You may simply want help thinking through a difficult FMLA, disability, accommodation, or return-to-work documentation request in your own practice.
Amica also provides peer consultation for independently licensed mental health professionals navigating occupational mental health documentation, functional impairment, boundaries, privacy, and clinical decision-making.
Peer consultation does not involve direct evaluation of your patient and does not transfer responsibility for clinical recommendations or documentation.
About Amica Clinical Consulting
Workplace evaluations are conducted by Janette Rodriguez, Psy.D., a licensed psychologist with experience in psychological assessment, clinical practice, occupationally relevant mental health evaluation, professional consultation, supervision, and training.
Dr. Rodriguez provides telehealth psychological services to adults in Florida and other jurisdictions where she is authorized to practice.
Janette Rodriguez, Psy.D.
Licensed Psychologist
Florida License #PY8153
PSYPACT Authorization to Practice Interjurisdictional Telepsychology #11733