ptsd C&P Mental Health Exam

[63Charlie]

I filed for PTSD. 

I was kicked to sleep on base, and diagnosed with a skull fracture.

VA determined I have PTSD... but that it isn't service connected. 

Instead, the VA determined that I have general anxiety disorder, and major depressive disorder, and service connected me with a 50% rating.

It's all documented in my SMRs.

 

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Edited August 28, 2016 by 63Charlie

[Berta]

Indeed he is.

But a NOD is more than just a ballpark statement that one is disagreeing with the decision.

On Christmas Eve (of course) 1988 my husband got a proposed reduction letter. The tree went flying out the front door.They proposed to reduce his then 30% PTSD to 10% since he had obtained 'substantial employment' with the VA  and also was in Voc Rehab.

I wrote the NOD stating he only got the VA job because the director didnt want him to file an EEOC case on another hiring matter for a full time fireman's position, when their personnel director violated the law.

OPM had found him qualified but he never even got an interview because the fire department at this VA hired relatives....for years without interviewing qualified veterans.He got a part time VA job in their dietetics department within hours after we talked to the director about this ( until another VA fireman position opened -per the director-and none ever did) yet he was a former PHVAC, and Nuke as well. Substantial employment? My butt.The personnel director was removed due to that fiasco.I gave them the VAMC's director's contact info and testified I was a witness to this entire situation, in the NOD.

Also I pointed out that ONE sole semester of VOC Rehab does not make anyone a rocket scientist and he already had requested accommodations to his PTSD, and needed a note taker and also tutoring from the college.

About 7-8 months later AmVets on his POA called here but he had not gotten home yet and AMVETS said that's OK, just tell him the VA will send him a formal letter that they have restored his comp back to 30%.

This was 1988 and no PC internet then.

I used the regulations they quoted in the proposed reduction letter against them and also used plain old common sense.

Same thing with my daughter's NOD.I raised CUE in it too.VA Educational department error.

That was resolved in 3 weeks,after I mailed her the NOD, she copied and signed it and sent it in.

I used the regulations from their own Chapter 35 application.I guess no one at VA Edu knew how to read the regs.

A NOD is the most important avenue of attack to a faulty VA decision.

Telling them why they are wrong, with evidence they have and how the regulations were misinterpreted

can do wonders....but many times they will still fight back.

If it is a question of a medical nature( lousy C & P exams  are the most likely cause of denials) than an IMO/IME is definitely in order.

If they said your SMRs were 'silent' for any nexus, with the NOD ,send them a copy of anything in the SMRs that prove the nexus.

And of course if they made a legal error to your detriment in a recent decision within the appeal period formally ask them to go CUE themselves. ....explained here many many times already....but file the NOD on time if they do not react to this type of CUE request.

 

 

 

 

 

Edited August 27, 2016 by Berta

[john999]

I agree, Berta.   But for a NOD I may have gotten a 100% rating as early as 1973.  It is confusing now that you must use a standard NOD form etc.  Back a few years ago vets were being told to file generic NOD so that nothing could be left out of your disagreement with the VA.   The reliance on formal claims and more formal methods to file claims for increase clash with my idea of EED for a claim.  Just like with PTSD diagnosis the VA is making it harder  to get the DX while pretending to make it easier.  New language regarding NOD's and Claims and Appeals is just making it harder for vets. I don't like the concept of the FDC.  I don't believe many vets start with a FDC, but must build the claim as they go and learn.   If I can use new evidence along with a NOD to bolster my argument then that is ideal.  I have always found the C&P exam to be the thing to attack with an IME/IMO right off the bat.  Since most C&P exams I have had at the VA were of very poor quality with the bias towards low balling and denial dripping off the exam doctors lips I have usually resorted to an IME at some point.  If you can add it with your NOD then you are giving the VA something to look at that might sway their feeble minds.  In the last few NOD's I filed I included a request for a DRO Hearing as a matter of course.  This is philosophy of getting a second bite at the apple before you go to the BVA.   I hate trips to the BVA because I do not trust those jokers.  Last time I went to BVA I had a lawyer and I still got shafted.  The judge did not read my lawyers brief.  He just accepted all our facts and evidence and a year later we got a denial.