Service Connection Injuries

[Mcafee]

Hello all hope all is well. I have been racking my brain to say the least my Question is this ( If you are injured on Active Duty upon discharge from Military Services. Who is responsible for The injury or injuries?Is the burden placed on the Veteran to follow up or is it the Military Services or the VA.? I am a little confused here with this .I know the Federal Citation that Iam arguing with the US. Army is clear however if the Services know you are or were injured to make the process user friendly?

[halos2]

Halos 2---Do I understand-

you dont have an IMO from Dr. Bash but you did submit IMos from two other private doctors?

Did those IMos fully support your claim and rule out,by medical evidence,any post service accidents or injuries as causing or contributing to your inservice back problems?

Did VA fully consider those IMOs?

The 50% you have- is the back problem related to the 50% disability?

I agree with Hoppy that this will take a strong Independent medical opinion-

but I seem to understand you have 2 already?

Did the VA fully give reasons and bases for not accepting these IMOs?

Have you claimed additional disability resulting from the falls and maybe even the car accident that aggravated the service connected condition?

"Did request personal hearing and brought up all evidence issues, and still denied, and copy of hearing is not complete of all the info I presented (knew I should have brought my own tape recorder in with me)."

Are you still within any deadlines to respond to on the denial from the hearing-

I mean-have they sent you a formal denial yet with appellate rights?

I assume this claim was filed after the VCAA of 2000.

In your VCAA letter that you got a few months after filing this claim-could you fully comply with everything the VA said they needed?

[halos2]

BERTA, I have posted to you but was not well versed on the use of this site and have not in a direct reply format.

Hopefully you will be able to read what I wrote. If not please get back to me and I will reply again. Thank you.

[halos2]

Hello all hope all is well. I have been racking my brain to say the least my Question is this ( If you are injured on Active Duty upon discharge from Military Services. Who is responsible for The injury or injuries?Is the burden placed on the Veteran to follow up or is it the Military Services or the VA.? I am a little confused here with this .I know the Federal Citation that Iam arguing with the US. Army is clear however if the Services know you are or were injured to make the process user friendly?

[Berta]

"They argue that a minor car accident, 2 falls on wet floor at work, and pulled back moving a desk in my office are the reasons for my back problems"

Yet these could have been aggravated by your inservice back problems.

I think you will need a stronger detailed IMO- these can be very expensive-I have a topic here under the search which states what an Independent Medical Opinion should cover-

I have seen the VA do this before- even with clear cut evidence in the SMRs-which you say you have in them- the VA will look for post service things like auto accidents to rule out service connection.

They dont connect the dots either-

they should have not only a stronger IMO that conforms to heir croteria but also the IMO doctor should highlight specific things in your SMRS , rule out how the auto accident etc did not cause the problems but aggravated the back problems you had, and also support their opinion with X rays and any MRI results prior to the accident and falls, as well as highlight your continuous treatment records.

"even though one said the original service connected injury weakened the spinal structure" this is good from an IMO doctor-but did they completely ignore this?

Are you able to scan the denial and block the personal info and attach it here?

Have you formally claimed fibromyalgia?

Is there any evidence of that in your SMRs?

Or symptoms of it? The VA didnt know what it was many years ago- it is still quite misunderstood.

[john999]

Your IMO doctor needs to minimize the impact of those falls and the car wreck and the back pull. How does the VA know all these details? What your doctor should argue is that you fell because of the service connected injury. Were your treated for a back injury after the car wreck and the back pull? Did you tell them about this stuff or did you get worker's compensation or something that was a public record they got access to somehow? Who gave them all this information about other injuries to your back? I hope you did not volunteer it. You don't have to lie about other NSC injuries but you don't have to volunteer information.

[halos2]

"They argue that a minor car accident, 2 falls on wet floor at work, and pulled back moving a desk in my office are the reasons for my back problems"

Yet these could have been aggravated by your inservice back problems.

I think you will need a stronger detailed IMO- these can be very expensive-I have a topic here under the search which states what an Independent Medical Opinion should cover-

I have seen the VA do this before- even with clear cut evidence in the SMRs-which you say you have in them- the VA will look for post service things like auto accidents to rule out service connection.

They dont connect the dots either-

they should have not only a stronger IMO that conforms to heir croteria but also the IMO doctor should highlight specific things in your SMRS , rule out how the auto accident etc did not cause the problems but aggravated the back problems you had, and also support their opinion with X rays and any MRI results prior to the accident and falls, as well as highlight your continuous treatment records.

"even though one said the original service connected injury weakened the spinal structure" this is good from an IMO doctor-but did they completely ignore this?

Are you able to scan the denial and block the personal info and attach it here?

Have you formally claimed fibromyalgia?

Is there any evidence of that in your SMRs?

Or symptoms of it? The VA didnt know what it was many years ago- it is still quite misunderstood.