john999

Sign it and send it. If you don't have more evidence, and you don't sign the letter the VA will wait up to a year to make a decision. I don't believe the 30 day thing, but you don't want the VA waiting if you have aleady sent in all your evidence.

The VA told me that they could not determine if I was IU because I was not working.

Psychotherapy at my VAMC does not exist. All it is is a 15 minute medication check. That is straight from the mouth of my VA psychiatrist. I get 15 minutes every three months.

My problem with the vet centers is that if you are trying to win a claim they don't help. One C&P exam will cancell out two years at the Vet Center. The VA completely ignored my report from the local Vet Center.

You better watch it with that psychology degree. The VA accused me of fraud based on the fact I had a degree in psychology when I made a mental health claim. That is the kind of C&P doctors you are dealing with at the VA. The exam doctor said my answers to his questions were to exact, thus fraud. I got the exam thrown out, but it took over a year. When you go for a C&P exam you have to act dumb, and try and look pitiful.

TestVet If it won't stress you too much go for it. You could buy a better pool or hot tube.

Berta I claimed it and got 60%. The C&P exam was a joke, but I appealed and got my PCP to do some testing. I got the 60% from the same DRO that denied my CUE. Let me say that if I had needed heart surgery or a bypass the VA would be the last place I would set foot. I got the heart problems secondary to DMII from AO. The cat can be skinned.

The VA likes to pull teeth so you may end up with dentures even if you are 100%. My VARO would not do an implant for me. I had to go to a private dentist. However, considering the VA's track record with my teeth it may have been worth it.

My experience is that if you want a condition accepted you better claim it. That goes for IU, agent orange conditions, and everything else.

How long ago did you get out of the service?

I used this index to discover my C&P exam was inadequate. Important tests had just been omitted for cost reasons. When I got the proper tests my rating went from 0% to 60%.

Cannon Keep asking your questions because that is how all of us learned what we know. When I came on this site I did not know what TDIU meant. 18 months later I had it. IMO's for the VA are sort of like Freshman English essays. They are more about form than content. You don't always have to get the most expensive IMO, but it has to be in the form the VA will accept. You need the buzz words and phrases. The one that gets lots of claims denied is the lack of a plausible statement that the IMO has reviewed all your SMR's and medical history.

With SSD I think you have to have worked a certain number of quarters in the last ten years. I know their is some rule like that to make everything harder. I got my SSD records and I submitted them myself. I did not wait. I got all my own records including voc rehab, SSD, federal disability retirement, proof of my last day of work, a certified copy of my DD214 and I submitted it to the VA myself because they were stalling and saying they did not have this or that blah, blah. The VA is supposed to send off for your SSD records if you tell them you are on SSD. It takes months if not years. Same with any disability retirement you might have from a civilian job. Sometimes they accept records you submit yourself, and sometimes they don't. If you are going for IU then SSD records establish for sure the last day you worked due to disability.

Remember that a CUE is done on a final decision. If you have the ability to appeal a denial that is much easier than trying to prove a CUE. An example is a claim you filed ten years ago that was denied and never appealed. You look at your C-file one day and you discover some gross error the VA made that would change the outcome of your claim. That might be a CUE. The CUE is the last resort.

All the drugs in the prozac family kill libido. They were first invented to treat premature ejaculation. They really cure that problem with no bada bing. I have this problem with imagining the worst all the time and prozac helped with that, but resulted in limp willy.

I agree it is weak. As John says you need a medical opinion that states the doctor has reviewed your SMR's, current medical records, and says that your condition is at least as likely as not related to your service. You may need what we call an independent medical opinion from a doctor. Here at Hadit there are examples of how the report should look like and what it should address. We have had this discussion many times about medical reports. We all start out with these kinds of hen scratches from doctors and learn usually the hard way that they won't cut it with the VA. Words like "possibly, probably, maybe" are death to a claim.

You definitely make more on SSDI than on SSA retirement at 62. I think you get a little less if you take SSDI than if you waited until age 65-66. I know that at 62 your SSDI becomes a regular SSA retirement and you keep the same rate.

Yes, the VA will hang your NSC conditions around your neck and claim that is the reason you can't work. They did it to me, and they only used four words of a sentence in my own doctor's report. It took another medical report to make it clear I was IU P&T soley due to my SC conditions.

Jack You really need a medical opinion that the reason you can't work is solely due to service connected PTSD. The VA can dx you with a PD, but if you have a medical report to state your IU is due to PTSD it won't matter about the PD.

Cannoncocker That's right. The VA does not want to award IU or 100% without a brawl. They hope you will just give up and take the denial. Persistence is the key to VA claims. It is frustrating trying to get these dimwits to read your evidence. They just don't care, but a DRO can make a decision that will grant your claim. All my claims have been appealed even the simple ones that were granted, but low balled.

The VA does not want any person with legal knowledge of VA procedures to be in the C&P exam room. 99% of exams would be thrown out as inadequate, or biased.

The Statement of the Case is pretty much a reiteration of your rating decision. It is supposed to explain why you got the rating you got and why you didn't get a higher rating. It is useful because it contains the clues that help you win your appeal. It lists the reasons why a complete grant of all benefits was not awarded and why. The "why" is what you attack in your appeal. I found the best why to attack an SOC is to get a doctor to refute the SOC point by point.

The fact that the VA makes a victim of MST prove the assult is part of the system that encourages rapists and other degenerates to keep doing these things. They know that for male or female service members to come forward will subject the victim to abuse and that is why they tend to keep their mouths shut. Then after they get out of the service the VA will say "veteran's records silent on MST.......claim denied".

You should have been on IU already!

I agree as long as VA knew you were unemmployed and you had evidence of major depression. I think your ED should go back to the date you filed your claim.