MikeHunt

Any recent experiences with VocRehab Self Employment or advice? I know they call it something different, and did read Krause's old posts I completed VocRehab and am unable to find a job. I've had a State counselor, sent a search log to my VocRehab Monthly. The new VocRehab Counselor refuses to respond to emails, except to perhaps answer 'received, thanks' seldomly. I'd like to open a little shop, and think buying tooling and a heat-treat/annealing oven. I can do a business plan, no problem. I do plan on having a Cong Rep file, as I already know they'll put it in the 'forget' file. Any experiences or advice on Self Employment? Thanks in advance

Yes, when I worked at the VARO, my ENTIRE chain, up to the secretary, was a non Vet. I'd see wicked non Vet trash come in, and move right up.

As I've stressed, use a doctor's opinion. You will win. Go to your state's Military Affairs department to file- They have the best financed VSO- in my state, it happens to be they chose The Legion- Yours may be different. Don't communicate with the VA- use the VSO. You are in, essentially, a trial- Calling the other side wouldn't be a good idea- and it isn't here. In short, they're not telling the Legion they called to drop your claim. This site is becoming FAR to confusing.

when I worked at DMC, we had a team revising the decades old software CAROLS. They had a eight person contractor team that had been there forever doing the work right next to my cube. They were finally moved into the sub-basement of the Whipple building. Two items that stuck me: 1. They made it mandatory to provide input for the new CAROLS software. After years, they were still getting the fundamentals??? 2. Years later, I heard the team had discarded all their work, and was going for an off-the shelf package. In sum, @broncovet

I'm getting IMs saying they have nothing to do. They even finished my claim. The VA isn't going to downsize, they'll have them do something. My fear is that 'something' will be what's been tried before- Re-hash old claims. So file.

Another GRANT. Research, research, research. Then: 1. Get an IMO/DBQ* (IME) 2. Get an IMO/DBQ* (IME) 3. Get an IMO/DBQ* (IME) Get others to complain; White House old-fashioned letter (not the White House VA line, THE WHITE HOUSE), Cong rep or PoA. DO NOT CALL OR WRITE THE VA ON YOUR OWN. DO NOT CALL OR WRITE THE VA ON YOUR OWN. DO NOT CALL OR WRITE THE VA ON YOUR OWN. Use the PoA in your state that is partnered with your state's Department of Military Affairs Everybody's advice is wrong, until you prove it otherwise- Yes, even- especially- mine. My years at the VA- we asked cube mates questions all day- The consensus many times turned out to be WRONG. Lawyers I spoke to were, as evidenced by today's grant, WRONG. Even if something's in black and white, that doesn't mean the VA will follow it. Expect a fight. Just get your fundamentals right, file and be patient thru the BS. DO NOT WAIT before you file. Do it today. Vets always put things off until it was too late. It was very sad. Good luck! (*I understand the VA now isn't releasing DBQ's, but find an old one and have your MD fill it out anyways. There's ZERO chance the contract examiner is going to call you for a phone exam when all the info is right in front of them. LOW HANGING FRUIT)

Good point. All we hear about is PTSD, when DPx or an anxiety DO percentages pay the same as PTSD percentages. Note: PTSD is a SUBSET of Anxiety DOs

I didn't get the question-

GRANT. Research, research, research. Then: 1. Get an IMO/DBQ 2. Get an IMO/DBQ 3. Get an IMO/DBQ Get others to complain; White House (not the VA White House VA line, THE WHITE HOUSE), Cong rep or PoA. DO NOT CALL OR WRITE THE VA ON YOUR OWN. (I understand the VA now isn't releasing DBQ's, but find an old one and have your MD fill it out anyways. There's ZERO chance the contract examiner is going to call you when all the info is right in front of them.)

Well, after walking from place to place, and being blown off by the County Vet Rep, so being spitting mad and near floridly psychotic, I noticed a community clinic on the way home, and stopped in. A nurse practitioner looked over my stuff, went and asked the MD. She asked why i couldn't go to the VA- I explained I'd worked there, and blah blah blah. She listened and then just wrote "CONFLICT" and told me she had the perfect doc! They scanned all my documents, and set an appointment for Monday AM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! $55 for each visit.

I'm sure things weren't going well with the VA BEFORE you did a 'cong,' so it's a little difficult to say they did less after the inquiry, LOL! 1) I do think it's helpful when there's a very specific issue you want addressed. A clerk in the RO's 'Cong team' has to research the issue and reply to the aide in writing. Some aides will email the clerk directly. I was friends with several clerks at my time in the VA; they would ask colleagues about specific issues AND sometimes that certainly resolved issues. 2) It's also good to have someone else advocate for you- The VA can, and will ignore or twist YOUR words, they're not going to do that to a Congressman or Representative. This is why rich people use a 'Mouthpiece' (lawyer) whenever they want something done. 3) Last, if they DO BS the congressional representative, or are rude, or short, that's an absolutely perfect letter to forward to the White House. Worked for me to the tune of an $18,000 check.

A private clinician certainly can give an IMO and complete the DBQ for PTSD. PTSD is a subset of anxiety DOs, which is a subset of mood DO's. In addition, my decision states, and i quote: "Greater weight is assigned the treatment records of Dr. X as opposed to the benefits questionnaires as they were completed in a clinical setting and contained more detailed rationale." Dr. X being the redacted name of the clinician whom I paid to complete both my IMO and fill the DBQs, to be clear. I filled out literally hundreds of exam requests, including PTSD, as a VSR and *most* of them went to private contractors (VES, etc), not the VA facility, so if this were a rule, which it's not, the VA, itself, is breaking it every minute of every day. Come up with a CFR, manual reference. I'm not sure why this false assertion continues to get spread on this site.

I had mixed results with them, the office knew more than most, but didn't know as much as they thought they did- and that's the dangerous part.

Go to the RO and ask the desk person to print a copy. Go to your VSO (Legion, DAV, VFW) and ask them to print a copy. The VA is a bureaucracy with one mission; to increase the bureaucracy. drawing out and complicating your access to your own information is just one way they accomplish that.

Great advice- I suggest first using your cong representative or senator. It's kinda like how they suggest not talking to police without a lawyer- The VA can take anything you say, or said you said, and use it against you. 'He told us to withdraw the claim' Then you can use the written lies they send to your cong rep to send to the White house. "They lied to a US Senator, for God's sake" All outa personal experience.

If you get someone else's records you need to report it to everyone. IG, news, the VA congress. They absolutely refused to use secure print feature included standard in the printer software, so an employee would just go to printer/copier and grab the stack another employee had printed, then they got your records and you got theirs

Yes. You should claim them. What happens is the VSR goes through your medical records and annotates the document and page number in the exam request. You can certainly get an IME (Fills out DBQ) for them. I'm not sure why Its repeated that PTSD can only be diagnosed by the VA. This is totally false, yet is repeated in every thread. The VA is doing less and less C&P exams, they're 'farming them out' to private contractors.

Well, I FOUND receipts for 6/23/00 that lists visit for "Dx 088.81 Disease, Lymes", and orders, pay and an EFMB badge award all showing I was in Ft. McCoy on 6/17/00. That's enough for a clinician to say ' ... More likely than not.' The original question - Sounds like it CAVC 04-1210 from Mr. Lippman's agent. I couldn't find it online (just some reference) and my local Law librarian though it was Smith v Nicholson. I'm not sure, however, it will do any good if it's a single judge decision. The thing I need to work on now is getting that IMO/IME, and sorting out what to claim. The decision, against what were told, has the Veteran SC for Lymes, eventhough it's the residuals that are the current disability, and those residuals. Make sense? They really jacked this guy around in that BVA decision . If the same thing occurs to me, it would be likely most of us would be dead before a final decision, so I want to avoid it.

One bit of advice in general, if you are filing for a disability, DON'T put anything unnecessary in box 14; Old VA records held up so many claims it was unbelievable! You'd get exactly what you got, and many times it was just redundant- Enough to show a 'current condition' was already in the record. You need to go to the hospital's ROI and use their form. If they want to mess with you, go to your congressman. They may not get it for them, but at least you get something in writing to 'adjust fire' off of.

DRC are a VA scam. They aren't decided any quicker than any other claim. all they do is put the workload and responsibility on your VSO, who is the one who is supposed to be watching the VA, and start that timeline AFTER the VSO has completed the work the VA is supposed to do!! Two scenarios: 1. You 'file' at your VSO. VAs accountability (and start of clock) only begins when your VSO has gotten the exam, and other records to the VA. This is likely to be months. My VSO has no clue how to schedule an exam; when I worked at the VA I scheduled hundreds.It's really easy to mess up. 2. You file traditionally: VA is responsible-and accountable- for nearly ALL aspects of developing the claim from the moment they receive it. The VA conceivably could do the ENTIRE claim in close to 30 days, not just rating.

Depends on how strong your claim is, and on which examiner you get. If you want a for-sure, do the last. The VA doesn't publish the common audio/hearing DBQ, or at least didn't 10 months ago.

You can get your FBI file, but that you don't have ready access to your VA C and E-file is just absurd. Unless you're the VA, then putting up another roadblock totally make sense.

The DBQ helps the rater determine the % of disability. So, yes. The rater can't determine whether a vet has Leukemia or not- Only an examiner. Some presumptives, I'd just ask the examiner to report based on presence (Agent Orange and Cancer) of the disability in records, as it's always 100%, like leukemia. so no There is verbiage that a clear medical record is supposed to be sufficient to rate, but I didn't see it- Not that I'd seen everything, or close to everything, or be in a position to see it.

As far as Lymes specific- I'd rather have an overview of finding Vet friendly doctors. I noticed one of the appeals ( Burns-2934.pdf ) CACV was highly impressed on a quote of a University specialist on a particular of the Veteran's Lyme's. Perhaps a University would be a good place to find a doctor. I don't understand why the VA was ordering exams when they had an IMO.

Thanks! I wrote Mr. Lippman. I couldn't find the case by online query, nor the law librarian through Westlaw (or whatever) and the 2006 batches aren't searchable, so that'll be my last resort. They are interesting to read, the Burns-2934.pdf CAVC beats the BVA down like ... But you have to remember, the VA is a bureaucracy that loves to build more bureaucracy, every remand is a major win for that end, even if some judges make you look dumb.