Step 6. Estimate the degree of functional impairment and work disability.

• The American Thoracic Society (ATS) recommends that impairment /disability should take place on two occasions:

  • Temporary disability: once the diagnosis of occupational asthma is made, the person should be considered 100% impaired for the job that caused the illness and should be removed from the job.
  • Permanent disability: assessment should be carried out two years after removal from exposure when impairment has been shown to plateau.



• Compensation Commissioner guidelines: (see Circular instruction no. 176):

  • assessment made at least 3 weeks after removal from exposure;
  • pre- and post-bronchodilator tests required;
  • current asthma medication requirements and post bronchodilator FEV₁ will be used to assess impairment;
  • a score is assigned to both functional loss and the necessity for medication as illustrated in Table 4a and Table 4b according to the total score as it appears in Table 5;
  • percentage permanent disablement (PD) is then assessed;
  • sensitisation associated with a total score=0: for occupational asthma where sensitisation persists after the worker has been removed from the specific work environment, and the lung function is not impaired and there is no need for asthma medication, a PD of 15% will be awarded;
  • determination of permanent disablement of workers receiving temporary partial (6 monthly intervals) or total disablement will be made at 24 months;
  • Compensation Commissioner may also pay for chronic medication beyond the 24 months.

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