john999

One thing to remember is that when you file your original claim that is just the first shot in the war to get benefits. If you get denied you will get the obvious hints as to what you need to get a grant. Keep fighting and stay in treatment. That is how you are going to win this thing. Somewhere down the line you will get some doctor to opine that your injuries are at least as likely as not service connected. This is all you need. Most vets don't get a full grant of benefits right away. They start the Long March at some point with a denial or a low ball rating. Injuries that get worse with age are common. If you have service medical records that document the injury that is the main thing. If you come back to the VA 10 or 15 years after a back injury and tell them it is worse now they will usually try and say it is the result of natural aging. You fight that with facts from your SMR's.

You should try and get buddy statements. I don't know how else to are going to connect the unreported and untreated incident 40 years later. You need either some record or some personal statements to show it happened in the military.

Just be careful your psychiatrist is not packing heat next time you see one. If you ask for a GAF you may get shot.

Yes, I think you should have gotten service connected for adjustment disorder at the earliest possible date if you filed a claim.

Papa You should see a shrink about the scar. You claim that you are so sensitive to how people will judge you due to the scar that you have social phobia and depression.

I guess if your claim goes from the VARO to the BVA and then to the AMC the VA can show that they are doing something. They are moving paper. They are making their numbers that they invent to do nothing while pretending to do their jobs. The bigwigs at the VA can go to congress and tell them that they have processed X number of claims when, in fact, they must moved them from one holding tank to another. Congress has no idea what is really going on, and really has no desire to know as long as they can somehow get the public off their backs.

Victor That is a very good question. Let's say you are 70% IU like me. If I somehow was able to go back to work and earn $25 an hour and work 40 hours a week would I still be considered to have a serious MH disability? I am not sure about that since I don't know anyone whoever got IU who went back to work. When you start to mess with the monster who knows what will happen?

If you get rated 100% schedular that supercedes TDIU. You can't be TDIU and 100% schedular at the same time. The value of 100% schedular rating is possible HB rating if it is for a single disability. The only problem with a 100% rating is that it can be reduced based on other factors besides not being able to work. If you are over 55 and P&T this probably won't ever happen, but don't stop treatment. If you are rated IU it is darn near impossible to ever get to 100% schedular. As you approach a wall the distance between you and the wall gets smaller and smaller. This is sort of how VA math works. If you are 90% and get another 40% that is 40% of residual 10% which makes 4% and you are still 90%. VA math strikes again.

Berta I have DMII and a cataract. The VA doctor said there was no relationship. Should I bother to claim this since I am going to go outside the VA to get it fixed? I thought if you had DMII and cataracts it was almost presumptive.

This is only for those injured after 2001. Us old guys will just have to go to the nursing home. The VA is not going to pay someone to quite their job to stay home with us if we are dying from AO.

Persistence pays off!

With a year of leave I think you can get to IU. You have to understand their is no sure thing as far as time limits. You are going to be waiting at the mail box for months probably.

I know a guy who just kept on eye on his aneuryism for years. When it reaches a certain size is when you need to get it fixed. I would not trust the VA to do something like this since they are just now telling you about it. What incompetent and negligent idiots. I think you are right about them blowing off MH cases.

The DOD and VA trying to limit their liability and save money. They cannot predict future actions by convicted criminals and people who have history of major mental disorders. How can they predict who might crack up under stress in combat or who might get PTSD? If they are so concerned with the budget for treating PTSD maybe they should not go to war on a credit card.

Squid The way these ratings for mental health issues usually go is 10-30% first claim. You appeal with more evidence and maybe they bump you up to 50%. If you are not working due to PTSD then the VA bumps you up to 70-100%. This usually takes a few years unless you are totally incapacitated by the PTSD. If you are working it is hard to get more than 50%, but that sets the table for a higher rating. Getting a decent rating from the VA is a job. You have to work at it. It sounds like you are working at it. Keep going to the VA and complain your head off about your symptoms.

You can be out on paid or unpaid leave and apply for IU. If you go back to work then you shoot your claim in the ass. If I was you I would try and get a home equity line of credit. At some point you may be without funds while you wait for IU. If you get desparate and go back to work that will prove you are not IU. The whole point is that you can't be working while you get IU. It sounds like your finaces are so tight that you can't go two weeks without a paycheck. I went five months without a paycheck. IU is not always a slam/dunk. Mine was not a slam/dunk and I was 70% and on SSD. From the time I went on leave without pay until the time I got IU was about 18 months. I got workers compensation and SSD and disability retirement from the post office before I got IU. It usually takes about 6 months to get near a rating for IU. That is my experience. It is just VA paperwork, and slowness not the quality of your claim. How much paid leave do you have?

See, when we have wars of choice the military can pick and choose to try and reduce any liability they might have for people who might be predisposed to PTSD. If there is a major war they will drag everyone in kicking and screaming, and all this screening will go out the widow. Do you think the Draft Board would give a damn about sniffing dogs and flashing lights? No, they just look for a pulse.

A friend of mine had the surgery. It is major surgery. I believe they cut through your belly making a large incision. It is not something you have on Monday and the next Monday you are walking around the park. My friend was in his mid sixties when he had it done. He was soon retired. The thing is that if the aneuryism breaks you are dead. I would go to the best heart surgeon in my city and get a second opinion. Have the best surgeon follow you on this and don't trust the VA. You don't want a resident at the VAMC to be doing this because it is very major surgery.

If you have constant pain you should probably claim chronic paid disorder to get a few percentage points added on to your rating. I have back pain and it makes me depressed.

Yes, if you have serious disabilites that are going to make you unemployable you do need to build yourself a mountain of documentation to support the fact that you just have enough power to get out of bed in the morning. When someone at the VA reviews your records they will say " How does this guy survive? I am glad I am not him". Being disabled is now your full time job. It is not like being a rocket scientist but it is a living. You records should show a steady if slow decline. You are going down slow.

FMLA can be paid or unpaid. At some point you have to be unemmployed to get IU. The best way is to ask for disability retirement if you can. That gives you a date certain that you stopped work and gives a reason....disability. You face the dilema that many face which is the wait between applying for IU and getting it.

You could ask for vocational rehabilitation. If they find you are not a candidate due to SC that would be good for IU. If you are 80% you should be able to get IU one way or other. If you had a doctor say you could not work due to your SC that would help.

My question is how can the army discharge someone with no rating at all, and then the VA gives you a disability rating that starts one day after discharge. You were OK when discharged and became disabled 24 hours later.

Yes, appeal because how can you have a decent exam for TBI and/or PTSD in 7 minutes? What tests did you get at the exam? Who did the exam? Was it a neurologist or psychiatrist? It is just not possible to assess these conditions in 7 minutes. Are you IU already? Are you trying to just get SC'ed or are you trying to get 100% schedular? Sounds like some of the psychiatric exams I got the in 80's where the resident shrink just asked me if I heard voices, and if I was working. It took five minutes.

Pete That's right, we don't know. I have insurance from my former employer that serves both me and my wife. Are my rates going to continue to soar? She is too young for medicare, so I keep the private insurance because it pays for all copays and deductibles. At some point they are saying that if your private medical insurance policy is worth over 20,000 bucks you will get taxed on it. Mine is not gold plated but it is worth about $1200 a month. I watched Front Line a few weeks ago and a guy went to five major industrial nations to compare with US. All had better heath care system. Some had private insurance and some had combinations of medicare-like system, private and VA style system. The market system is great for those who have plenty of money. For the poor it sucks. All the costs of medical care are cheaper in other nations. We pay more for less. The health care system here is like a vampire that sucks people dry and then spits them out when the money is gone. I rushed my wife to the hospital last year, and the first question they asked me was what kind of insurance I had. Since I have good insurance she got the CT scan and immediate and great care. $36,000 for five days in the hospital. If she did not have insurance I believe they would have turned her away because she was not bleeding to death. She would have died if she did not get care but it would have taken a few weeks.