john999

That's good and there are about 20 other diseases that are caused by dioxin exposure they should add before we are all dead. What is the average age of Vietnam vets now? I bet it is over 60 years of age. Time is running out for us.

The VA repeats constantly that it judges each claim on its individual merits. Also, BVA decisions don't set precedents. You need the medical opinion in your particular case.

What you will probably find is that the VA is going to try to blame every condition you have on your obesity instead of the other way around. I have a friend who has DMII from AO, and also a heart condition and HBP. The VA blames all the secondary conditons on his being obease. If they could get away with it I bet they would blame the DMII on his being obease. If you had an alcohol or drug proplem the VA would attempt to blame all other conditions on these problems instead of looking for underlying condition that drove the person to drink or drugs. Why you ask? Because alcohol and drug abuse are not compensable. It is the same with obesity unless an accident altered your brain and glands to make you overeat and you could prove it. You could say that the PTSD causes obsessive behavior one of which is overeating. Your doctor has to finese it.

I got secondary SC for some DMII complications and you need strong medical statements that explain the nexus. Even conditions that are accepted by medical community as secondary to certain other conditions need a strong medical report for VA purpose.

I imagine it depends somewhat on the number of vets in your VARO area. In Florida where I live my DRO's have usually taken about a year. It can take much longer if all your I's are not dotted and T's not crossed. I would keep calling to make sure there is nothing the VA is waiting for to go forward.

You know the troops from WWI brought the Flu back to the states with them. It killed young healthy people. My mother who was born in Ireland said she remembered the hearses going by in long lines when she was just a child. It was the Flue of 1918. Picture this: A guy going down your street with a wagon or truck ringing a bell.....Bong, bong....bring out your dead. Bring out your dead. Like the black death. You know the 1918 Flu still exists in certain high security labs. They obtained it from the corpes of dead WWI vets and cultured it. This was decades after because the army took tissue samples, and the flu was still alive.

Every few years some scientist says he has a cure for some mental illness. Unless they can rewire brains I put little faith those who claim a cure for any emotional problem including PTSD. It is a great way to funnel money towards someone's research project, or to tout a drug to make money. Maybe it is the bumps on our heads.

The VA has a duty to provide the HINI shot to all vets who need it. Nobody knows what this flu might mutate into like 1918. It is a long shot, but if that happened people would go nuts, and you would not be able to get the shot for love or money. I am going to get the shot just as soon as it is available. Get it when you can is my advice. About 20,000 people die each year from complication of regular flu.

The only discussion we should have as vets is how to burn the VARO, locally and in D.C. , to the groud, hypothetically speaking. There are 25 million of us and we are treated like dogs. 40 years of being treated like a third class citizen.

I really wonder if the VA does the calculation on bilateral conditions. I am bilateral for both hands and feet. I get 90% total with a 70% rating, 60% rating and 10% ratings for PN on all four limbs plus 10% for DMII. I don't see where the VA did the bilateral rating on my hands and feet. I know when you get close to 100% you play hell actually getting 100% no matter how many conditions you have.

ChampVA coordinates with my wife's BC/BS. She was in the hospital for a week and we did not pay a dime. I pay for the BC since it was part of my retirement benefits. I just hope I don't get priced out of my ability to buy the insurance. It costs half of my miserable federal pensin to buy it as is because I have SSD offset.

It is always good to get a second opinion regardless of it being a VA doctor or private doctor. Before you let someone do some major surgery on you get the SECOP. Sometimes in emergency you can't wait, but usually you can wait.

There are lots of other drugs for HBP. I was taking one drug and it made me cough. So I switched to another durg which is probably slowly killing me without my knowledge. At least the cought went away.

Thanks, I have been tearing my hair out trying to figure out why I am in so much pain with such inconsequential objective findings. If I find out that the statins have caused this misery I am going rejoice first, and then I think I will strangle my doctor who presribed the drug to me. I have had about 5 MRI's, spinals x-rays, nerve blocks etc with no results. I have become dependent on narcotics. When my psychologist said it might be a food allergy it got me thinking. I have suffered like a dog for a number of years while taking my zocor every night like a good boy. I think I will call my real internist. He may brush it off because everyone takes statins now. He takes them. My shrink takes them. Half of the medical professionals over the age of 40 take them. I think many may have a mental block about the side effects of long term use. It did lower my cholesterol by about 40% and I never even had a belly ache. I know there is some evidence that cholesterol levels may not be the factor in heart attacks. They may be a marker for something else. You know we are all just lab rats for the drug companies because we are the ones who will show if long term use of a host of drugs cause unanticipated consequences. It took the VA 30 years to determine that AO caused DMII. People in their teens are now getting DMII from AO 40 years later and I remember the NCO drinking it to show it was harmless. He died from stomache cancer.

You need a much stonger statement that what the wizard gave you. You need what the Petes say you need.

1978 If you are going to prove service connection due to exposure to toxic agents you are going to need a lot more than just symptoms you listed. You are going to need medical opinions that the agents caused your problems, and that you were exposed to the agents. If the only thing you have in your SMR's ear, nose and throat infections and respitory infections you need major, major help with this claim. Are the autoimmune diseases presumptive for exposure to the agents in question? If they are not they you have to prove it. Just because some sailors say all those problems were caused by the agents you talk about is not proof. You are claiming Service Connection for 7 autoimmnune diseases from different agents? You might as well get a shotgun and load it up with birdshot and shoot it at the claims process. Do you have any evidence in your SMR's besides ear, nose and throat infections to claim all the diseases you list that you have now? Are you by any chance a heavy smoker?

You know every time I have asked for a copy of my file over the years I get less and less each time from NARA.

I have been taking statins for a number of years. I have pain that has gotten worse over the years in my back muscles. I am wondering has anyone else ever had a similar reaction to statin drugs. My brother has some kind of neuropathy and he thinks his is due to the statin drugs he takes. My pain started gradually and has gotten much worse with no objective evidence of anything in my back that could cause such pain. I am grasping at straws. I have been to the back doctors and arthritus doctors and all the rest with no result except lots of narcotic pain killers which don't work anymore.

It would be the same if you had SSD and some was for SC condition, and some of it was for NSC condition. That could hurt you in the same way. The VA tends to focus on NSC conditions when looking at IU requests. If your doctor writes a strong letter for IU based on SC conditions it may not matter that much. When asking for increased disability you want to focus 100% on SC conditions.

The voc rehab statement that you can't be rehabbed due to SC and "NSC" conditions could hurt you. The VA may focus on your NSC problem and blame that for your inability to work. If you have not submitted that evidence I would hold off. Voc Rehab and the VBA don't talk to each other as far as I know. IU must be caused solely by SC conditions. I got denied the first time I went for IU because my doctor mentioned a NSC condition. He did not say that was the reason I could not work, but that is how the VA interpreted it. He wrote three pages on how my SC condition kept me from working and the VA took a phrase about a NSC condition to deny my IU. That is a string you don't want them to pull on.

The opiates themselves won't hurt your liver. It is the tylenol that will hurt the liver. Just be damn sure you never get a urine or blood test with alcohol in your system. You are a recovered alcoholic as far as the VA is concerned. Never, ever tell them you have gone off the wagon. They will try and blame all your problems on alcohol abuse. If alcohol has damaged your liver I think you can get compensated for the liver damage, but not for the alcoholism itself. Weird I know!

It is a great thing. You may find it hard to ramp down from the battle. You are probably better off than 60% of the American public who are going to have to work til they drop. Finacially speaking it is the truth. Too bad we had to become disabled to find out that fact. If I had worked 40 years at the federal job I had I would still be better off getting IU, SSD, my disability pension and my long term disability insurance 8 years ago. My federal pension is a joke.

Half the people in the USA have bulging discs with no symptoms. Wait before you have surgery and for heaven's sake don't let the VA do it. There is no certainty that your pain will go away after surgery. It might get worse. There is a condition known as "failed back surgery syndrome".

The VA dreamed up "veteran centered scheduling" at my VAMC. You can't just make an appointment when you leave the hospital. You make an appointment to make an appointment. Just more rationing of care under a new name. You have to struggle to make an appointment. The VA knows that many will just say to hell with it. I have medicare. Why do I go to the VA? Just to get pills and document my disability. You have to be motivated just to use the VA system. As the number of vets trying to access the VA increases the hoops to jump through will get higher. I think they are playing "crack the whip" with us. If they can't treat all the vets asking for care they will try to discourage us from using the system.

I know that special clinics like podiatry are incredibly hard to get at my VAMC. If you miss an appointment it will take months if not years to get another one. I have had doctor no shows and that really gets my goat. A day wasted going out to the VA and finding out the doctor is a no show. The VA is already rationing care, so when you miss an appointment they will kick you to the curb. The dental clinic is a joke. You can't schedule dental visits in advance. I get one dental exam every two years. I end up using a private dentist sometimes. Everyone is going to have to cancell or reschedule appointments, but it is unwise to skip them if you want to continue to be in the loop. Once you are in the loop I think you can get care at any clinic, but if you fall out of the loop you cease to exist. That goes for mental health in a big way. My shrink always tells me to stay in the loop. I get only 4-5 appointments a year with my VA shrink. If I miss one then it means an extra two months to get in to see him. No matter how I might abuse the VA system I think it is important to stay in the loop for the long haul. Who knows what will happen to medicare or private insurance? Imagine a world where you actually will depend entirely on the VA for treatment. It could happen. My BC/BS is now demanding all psychiatric visits be pre-authorized. That is there response to government demanding that they treat psychiatric illness on par with physical illness. They intend to stall and chisel the shrinks so they won't accept BC. BC/BS is the largest health insurance company in the USA and supposed to be non-profit. I wonder what the CEO makes in salary.....20 million a year?