In order to improve productivity, wellness and inclusiveness, it is of paramount importance for a company to be informed about what having a chronic disease means for a person, and to be trained to handle the issue of having an employee with such a condition.
Several illnesses can occur during a lifetime and especially during working age and each one of these should be equally considered. The following Appendix presents some brief case vignettes and fact sheets on the most frequent chronic diseases that might be encountered in the workplace. The diseases presented in this list (e.g., neurological, musculoskeletal, cardiovascular, respiratory, metabolic disorders) has dramatically increased in recent decades, affecting all sectors, including the social and economic aspects of the work sector and have been selected according to the Global Burden of Disease study that identifies the most common chronic diseases in Europe in people of working age. The diseases selected are thus to be intended only as examples, and the appendix makes no claim to be exhaustive.