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Lemuel

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Lemuel last won the day on February 23

Lemuel had the most liked content!

About Lemuel

Profile Information

  • Military Rank
    E-6 Hospital Corpsman 1rst Class
  • Location
    Disabled at home
  • Interests
    Organic Brain Syndrome activist since 1987

Previous Fields

  • Service Connected Disability
    100%
  • Branch of Service
    USN
  • Hobby
    Activist for Organic Brain Syndromes

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Lemuel's Achievements

  1. I wrote, PACT ACT claim for bladder cancer, Agent Orange. Whatever you handled or were exposed to. I do not think it matters if you are not on the presumptive list of PACT ACT exposure locations as long as the substances were where you were, and military records will show that. Mine was easy. For yours, it may require the RO to do a little research. But with your medical opinion, it should not be a problem. Just may take a lot longer than mine did.
  2. I think my grand son obtained his father's unused educational benefits. His father served in two periods of war. One in the marines and one in the navy. Out of the marines on a medical discharge in the gulf war, I think. Do not know how that worked.
  3. As a Navy medic, I was trained to not self-diagnose and treat. Doctors are trained the same way. We discuss diagnosis and treatment with our medical caregiver but we try to state the problem to cover all bases incase our thinking has left something out that is important that the caregiver is trained to draw out of us in pursuit of diagnosis so treatment is the right treatment. I will bring this up to CCK in a short email. It covers a lot of issues in my appeal. Limited examinations cause physical damage as well as financial damage. Something may have been missed by your PC that the C&P examiner may pick up if allowed to do so. CAPN, ask your treating physician for an "etiology as well as a statement of disabling" in an Independent Medical Opinion report. He should state how long he has been treating you and why you opted for his treatment instead of VA treatment. VAHA physicians are also limited in not being able to discuss etiology in their medical documentation of treatment. This would be a good statement as an additional reason to not go to the VA if you can afford or have access to outside treatment. Why have limitations put on your medical review that may cause other medical caregivers to miss something in your care.
  4. Veterans often get outside medical treatment and evaluations for "independent medical opinions." (IMO) And should do as you have done, because VA examiners, even the contract ones, go through training to do more than weed out false claims. They have to strictly follow examination orders and cannot go anywhere the examination leads them contrary to 38 CFR Chapter 4. For example: My thumb/wrist joint has been excluded from my wrist claim for years. Still do not have an evaluation on the ankylosis of that joint. Only the flexion of the wrist as a whole because I claimed a "wrist problem". Same goes for a "hearing problem". Any examination of the wrist is supposed to be of the wrist as a whole. Any examination of a hearing problem should automatically include decibel loss and tinnitus. You should not have to claim each joint separately, especially if multiple joints are involved. You should not have to assess and define the audiology of your hearing loss. You are not a doctor and should not have to self-diagnose. Those are the examiners problems that they have been trained to assess and should not be limited in assessment, according to 38 CFR, but somewhere in the VABA C&P process there is authority to limit examinations paid for by the VABA. I do not know if CCK will get me EEDs that I made motions for in the BVA decision that was remanded by the CAVC. Too few specifics in the joint motion for remand. Not clear if the remand was for a "legacy hearing" or for AMA. I was angry at the pro bono VA attorney who did not get specifics in the remand and in fact allowed the VA GC to get a vague limitation in the remand.
  5. Frontier in Cheyenne, WY who measured for my ramp and could have gotten the same setup from the manufacturer. Could be a manufacturing contractor who has their own "distribution system". VA would try to go cheaper and if the manufacturer was providing most of the prefabricated ramps but the VA was getting ripped off by local dealerships, they may have went to a contract bid from the manufacturers like the government motor pool does for cars. It is obviously a very new thing. Frontier went form going to set me up once my VABA request was approved to calling me to tell me that in February. And then this month OT said they would provide from VAHA. Seems consistent to me that it might have happened. It was not Frontier that came to measure when they set up my stair ramp last year. So they must distribute for a different company. Now it was a different company that appeared to be just getting started that came yesterday. They used surveying equipment to measure so may have been some set up problems that caused injuries and the manufacturer wanted to dump some of the dealerships that did not have qualified personnel to make the setup. When Frontier called they said it was a company out of Washington State. But did not say which one. I think the local VA had a good contract with Frontier for everything wheelchair or stair ramp until this change.
  6. I think the fights are worth it. You do not want a big fight with a lot of issues like mine. Take them one at a time as they come up and try to get them handled properly even if you have to give some back pay to a NOVA attorney or firm. I have a lot of issues now and not sure how many CCK will want to bring up. Too many at one time makes it harder to get justice on any one issue unless you are trying to get SMC and they all count to that. Still seems it would have been easier to get SMC if all issues were resolved and no requests for additional ratings were needed.
  7. And that is why we should get the VSO's to take up this issue for us. A few examples, like mine, would go a long way to help. If anyone knows a reporter who will write it up and get it published, it may tweak Congress into action. That is what happened with TBI in 2008.
  8. My application date was August of 1987. My award date was September of 1985, nearly 2-year difference and based up on my last day of full-time employment. The "extra-schedular" claim laid in the file, without being developed by the AOJ until it was remanded by the BVA in May of 2017. I had a denial by the BVA in 1990 and had presumed it had been addressed in their blanket denial then. There was no veterans appeals court then. It went through a DRO review, from 2017-2020, at the Central Office (DC DVA Central not Regional) where it was recommended with approval to the Director, Compensation Services. It was approved by the Director and Payment was made within a month after going back to the Central Office for finale execution. Yes, that is a super long EED for TDIU. But it demonstrates that it is based upon your employment dates, not claim date. If you got less EED than I did, back to your last day of full-time employment, then you need to apply for an extra-schedular EED if it is a significant amount of money, and you were made to live poor for a while.
  9. I was told, one company is doing all for the U S. Whether VABA side (permanent modification) or VAHA side from OT prosthetics services. Ask when you get your wheelchair ordered why prosthetics is doing mine and not yours.
  10. In my appeal before the BVA, I raised the Fifth Amendment of the Constitution, "taking of property without compensation," issue. CCK has that to raise now if they see fit. My argument is that all back pay should be paid at current rates. You should be able to buy the same amount with the money in your shopping card as you would have then. For example (not exact figures): If a loaf of bread cost X$ in 1985, then the difference should have been calculated in current $ so that I could by the same X number of loaves of bread on the date the increase was made as the unpaid back date. If a loaf of bread cost $1.00 in 1985 and in 2017 in cost $5.00 then I should be paid the $4.00 difference x how many dollar difference there is between the 1985 rate and the 2017 rate when I finally received the back pay to buy those loaves of bread. That is clear as mud, but I think the smart people at CCK will get my drift. Whether they will bring up a "Constitutional Question" that would result in a lot of "back pay" correction for a lot of living veterans and their substitutes, is the question. Paid at the current rate in 2020, my back pay would have been over $200,000.00 more. If I had been paid from 1985 the full 100% I would have been able to buy a house, in 1985, that would have been worth the over $200,000.00 more, in the Los Angeles area where I was living in poverty, in 2020.
  11. When I got my EED for TDIU back to September of 1985 in 2020, I was paid the difference between the 100% in the year paid and the rating in the year I had already been paid. I went from 40% in 1985 to 50% in 1989 to 70% in 2009. I was paid the differences to my 70% award in 2009 in my April 2020 EED award by the Director, Compensation Services. From 2009 to 2017 I was paid the difference between 70% and 100% awarded by the BVA on the "presumptive" rating. I will attach my analysis of the 2020 award. It was off under $5.00 short so I did not quibble. I think you can see how it is done with an EED. 20200708 TDIU payment calculation by Lem abrigded.pdf
  12. They just finished measuring form the ramp for my wheelchair to go to door to the living room instead of the solarium. Takes about two months to delivery. That would make it super-fast compared to VABA house modifications. And for those renting, much easier to get landlord approval. When you leave, the ramp leaves, back to the way it was.
  13. Nexus is TBI or Spinal injury. Spine above T-4 as in the neck or just below the neck can give you some weird ones.
  14. My 01/31/21 NOD was filed on a 10182. I think it is required now. I faxed it to the Evidence Center and the request for expediting because of age. The BVA Decision was dated 11/29/2022. The CAVC remand is dated 10/26/23. So moving fairly quickly for me. Should be back at the BVA soon but suspect it is taking longer because of the remand and the clerk will not be able to get away with not doing the required work this time. CCK is representing me on my SMC claims for me and my wife. I guess they will also have to take the remand but will not take the PCAFC denial. Have to call one of the class attorneys for that from Beaudette & Beaudette v McDonough. It is a VAHA decision not a VABA decision is the reason as I understand. Seems to me since I am at the BVA, that issue could also be decided.
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