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Please Clarify If Dic Is For 100% Vets Or Only For 100% P&t Vets?

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tssnave

Question

1. If a vet had a 100% rating for 10 years before death but had NOT been granted Permanent and Total status would his dependents still be eligible for DIC? In other words, is being granted P&T required for a DIC claim or is 100% rating for 10 years enough to allow your spouse to apply for DIC? In a perfect world if you were rated 100% for 10 years you would have a P&T rating but given the amount of time it takes to get our claims processed I can see where a vet, especially in a retro claim, could have a 100% rating but not P&T.

2. If you are 100% due to IU are your dependents still entitled to DIC?

Please provide any links you have to the regulation or VBM for the answers. I am only asking these specific questions about DIC, not any other general information about it like dying before 10 years of your sc disability. I'm just interested in understanding the 10 year 100% DIC rule and whether or not you had to have been grated P&T. I'm also curious if 100% IU counts the same as 100% schedular.

The VA DIC info sheet doesn't state anything about P&T but the 10/31/06 VAwatchdog.org News Flash seems to state that a veteran had to be granted P&T or his dependents would be denied benefits (go to the bottom of the article and count up six paragraphs to see what I'm talking about):

http://www.vawatchdog.org/old%20newsflashe...0-31-2006-1.htm

Thanks,

TS Snave

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I am not real clear on the Veteran's Watchdog article. Though the author refers to the widow being denied benefits because the vet wasn't 100% P&T -- the two things that come to my mind are:

1. It is highly likely if the Vet dies, he would die from the lung cancer and / or diabetes and / or complications -- which have been SC due to Agent Orange. If they were the cause of, or materially contributed to his death - his widow would be eligible for DIC -- as the vet's SC condition caused, or contributed to his death.

2. If neither of these conditions caused or contrinuted to his death - then she would not be eligible for benefits because he had not been rated 100% for TEN YEARS --regardless of whether it was from the SC condition(s) or Unemployability.

I am not quite sure what point the author was trying to make. As it seemed to me to have more to do with the ten years than the type of disability. And in this case - he was indicating the vet would die from cancer. His cancer was SC'd. That equals DIC.

If a vet dies from a SC'd condition - that was only 10% disabling for 1 month - that STILL equals DIC - because the SC condition caused, or contributed to, the veteran's death - regardless of how disabling it was, or how long they were rated.

And retro also counts - under "entitled to recieve"

Free

1. If a vet had a 100% rating for 10 years before death but had NOT been granted Permanent and Total status would his dependents still be eligible for DIC? In other words, is being granted P&T required for a DIC claim or is 100% rating for 10 years enough to allow your spouse to apply for DIC? In a perfect world if you were rated 100% for 10 years you would have a P&T rating but given the amount of time it takes to get our claims processed I can see where a vet, especially in a retro claim, could have a 100% rating but not P&T.

2. If you are 100% due to IU are your dependents still entitled to DIC?

Please provide any links you have to the regulation or VBM for the answers. I am only asking these specific questions about DIC, not any other general information about it like dying before 10 years of your sc disability. I'm just interested in understanding the 10 year 100% DIC rule and whether or not you had to have been grated P&T. I'm also curious if 100% IU counts the same as 100% schedular.

The VA DIC info sheet doesn't state anything about P&T but the 10/31/06 VAwatchdog.org News Flash seems to state that a veteran had to be granted P&T or his dependents would be denied benefits (go to the bottom of the article and count up six paragraphs to see what I'm talking about):

http://www.vawatchdog.org/old%20newsflashe...0-31-2006-1.htm

Thanks,

TS Snave

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I dont get Jim's point here either-

when the VA sent me my DIC award the veteran had been declared in a prior award as 100% P & T for PTSD posthumously-

Once a veteran is dead -with 100% SC in affect or proven by the widow as a re-opened claim-they-in my opinion- were obviously 100 % P & T in their lifetime for the same SC disability.

It makes sense- say a vet has 100% rating for AO lung cancer.

Say they die- they were,in their lifetime permanently and totally disabled by the AO cancer because they are now dead.

The VA doesn't account for common sense - all the time-

that is why-even if a widow expects DIC the widow (or widower should certainly fight for any accrued benefits too that would come from a claim the vet had pending when they died-as the results of that claim could be highly instrumental in the DIC claim.

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Thanks to all for replying.

I wrote Jim Strickland at vawatchdog.org and asked him to clarify why the RVN vet had to get P&T before he died and he wrote back to say that he (Jim) was on vacation and I could query him again in 3 weeks for the answer, which was complex. I will let you know when I know why the RVN vet had to get P&T before he died for his wife to be eligible for DIC.

The good news is that the vet did win his claim and is still alive!!! VAwatchdog.org much like hadit.com is a wonderful resource for vets.

As Jbasser pointed out, I knew the DIC info sheet the VA posts says "totally disabling", I just wanted to make sure that there was not some hidden legal meaning in "totally disabling" that included the requirement for the disability to be rated permanent for 10 years.

Thanks again for all your help,

TS Snave

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Read former post by jbasser regarding the DIC issue...

Dependency and Indemnity Compensation (DIC) www.va.gov (survivor benefits under benefits section)

What Is DIC?

DIC is a monthly benefit paid to eligible survivors of a

• military service member who died while on active duty, OR

• veteran whose death resulted from a service-related injury or disease, OR

• veteran whose death resulted from a non service-related injury or disease, and who was receiving, or was entitled to receive, VA Compensation for service-connected disability that was rated as totally disabling- for at least 10 years immediately before death, OR

- since the veteran’s release from active duty and for at least five years immediately preceding death, OR

- for at least one year before death if the veteran was a former prisoner of war who died after September 30, 1999.

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Thanks jbasser-

also the regs cover DIC for any veteran whose death was due to VA health care -as defined in 38 USC Sec 1151.

Your P & T question- oddly enough the VA can make a 100% P & T posthumous award.

In other words a vet with 100% SC or TDIU- at death- has actually had the disability as permanent and total in their lifetime-the VA cannot resurrect that fact nor C & P a dead vet.

This is a matter of semantics-

but also a legal point-

Every vet who dies with 100% SC rating was P & T by virtue of their death-that makes sense.

However the 10 year 100 % P & T reg makes it possible for "enhanced" Sec 1318 DIC which isn't enhanced at all-

A survivor with a DIC claim whose vet husband or wife had 100% SC P & T for only a few years could perhaps claim that they SHOULD have been 100% SC P & T for ten years prior to death.

Very strong medical evidence could make an award like that- for enhanced DIC -possible.

The VA fights death claims from widows and widowers sometimes very aggressively.

Make sure your spouse gets an autopsy done and that he or she gets a real doctor's opinion if the DIC claim is denied without complete medical rationale.

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