Once your caregiver leave plan is submitted, there are certain leave certification forms that must be signed and completed by you and your care recipient’s medical provider to ensure your leave can be approved. For your caregiver leave to be approved, these forms must be signed, completed and returned to Cocoon within 15 days of your leave submission.

Once you submit your plan, you will be directed to download a leave form packet that includes all of the necessary forms that are applicable to your caregiver leave.

These may include:

Cocoon will autofill the employer section of your leave forms, but you'll need to complete and sign the Employee section on all forms. Here you'll describe your relationship to the recipient of care, as well as the type of care you are providing and the amount of time you anticipate providing care.

You can download these leave forms here.

Once you've downloaded and completed your portion of the form, you will need to coordinate with your family member's medical provider to have them complete and sign the Healthcare Provider Section on the form. Please ensure that they complete, at a minimum, all the fields highlighted in yellow on the leave forms. You can download these leave forms here.

Your request to go on caregiver leave must be approved under your employer’s leave policy and/or any applicable leave laws like the federal Family and Medical Leave Act.

Until these forms are submitted back to Cocoon, you can start your leave, but it may qualify for protection under the applicable leave law or policy.

The health care provider providing medical certification should be the provider treating your family member for the condition creating your need for caregiver leave.

These forms must be completed, signed and returned to Cocoon within 15 days of the date on which you submit your leave plan.

Cocoon will deny the leave and notify both the employee and the employer. If your leave is denied, it may have implications for your employment status and/or company benefits.

You can explore your options after a leave denial here.

Cocoon has found that medical providers are much more responsive and more willing to work directly with their patients and their patients' families than leave administrators to coordinate leave form completion. Additionally, medical providers have very strict policies as to whom and how they release private medical information. This is particularly the case when the medical provider is releasing information to an entity that is not their patient’s own employer. Given the sensitivity of requesting certification from a provider who is not your own, we've found that you are much better positioned to coordinate the medical certification directly than have Cocoon attempt to coordinate on your behalf.