How stage 4 kidney cancer diagnosis didn't stop this young woman from getting a great new job
Can you get a job if you have cancer? Kidney cancer diagnosis didn't stop a young woman from getting a great new job.
Katie Coleman stood face-to-face with a choice no job seeker should ever have to make. She could tell her prospective employer she had stage 4 kidney cancer, the most life-threatening stage of all.
Or she could stay mum.
She knew she risked losing any shot at the job by being honest about her diagnosis — or risked losing her self-respect by keeping quiet about it.
This may sound like the plot of an episode of “Grey’s Anatomy.” It’s not. It’s the decision that confronted the 31-year-old resident of Austin, Texas, who has been battling the deadly disease for nearly three years.
“The number of ppl advising me to not disclose my [diagnosis] is astounding,” she tweeted in mid-April. The concern was that employers might worry about the costs and absenteeism that can result from such a condition — even though federal law prohibits employers from taking health issues into account when hiring.
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