A routine medical exam last February revealed that Kevin Flynn needed another brain surgery, which his doctors immediately scheduled two days later.
Flynn’s pregnant wife Emily, a leave specialist at Unum’s headquarters in Chattanooga, was forced to juggle her work and child care roles to help her 30-year-old husband, who has congenital hydrocephalus and required his 12th operation to repair a shunt implanted in his brain to help remove excess cerebrospinal fluid.
“When I found out he needed surgery that quickly, it kind of took everyone off guard,” Emily Flynn recalled. “I quickly had to figure out how to deal with child care and my responsibilities at work and how to manage all that with my leave time and still be able to pay our bills. It gets really complicated very quickly.”
Flynn and other Unum employees will face fewer such complications this year since Unum adopted a new caregiver policy to provide its workers up to five days a year of paid caregiver leave for those who require extended time away from work to care for a spouse, child or parent due to a serious health condition.
The Chattanooga-based insurance giant added the benefit for its nearly 10,000 employees across the country in response to growing concerns among workers for assistance in caring for elderly parents or other sick family members. Although the federal government allows workers to take up to 12 weeks of unpaid leave for such care under the federal Family and Medical Leave Act of 1993, most private employers do not provide paid leave to care for a family member other than a newborn child or adopted child.