Ask Your VA Claims Questions | Read Current Posts
Read VA Disability Claims Articles
Search | View All Forums | Donate | Blogs | New Users | Rules
- 0
-
Tell a friend
-
Recent Achievements
-
Our picks
-
VA Disability Claims: 5 Game-Changing Precedential Decisions You Need to Know
Tbird posted a record in VA Claims and Benefits Information,
These decisions have made a big impact on how VA disability claims are handled, giving veterans more chances to get benefits and clearing up important issues.
Service Connection
Frost v. Shulkin (2017)
This case established that for secondary service connection claims, the primary service-connected disability does not need to be service-connected or diagnosed at the time the secondary condition is incurred 1. This allows veterans to potentially receive secondary service connection for conditions that developed before their primary condition was officially service-connected.
Saunders v. Wilkie (2018)
The Federal Circuit ruled that pain alone, without an accompanying diagnosed condition, can constitute a disability for VA compensation purposes if it results in functional impairment 1. This overturned previous precedent that required an underlying pathology for pain to be considered a disability.
Effective Dates
Martinez v. McDonough (2023)
This case dealt with the denial of an earlier effective date for a total disability rating based on individual unemployability (TDIU) 2. It addressed issues around the validity of appeal withdrawals and the consideration of cognitive impairment in such decisions.
Rating Issues
Continue Reading on HadIt.com-
- 0 replies
Picked By
Tbird, -
-
Are all military medical records on file at the VA?
RichardZ posted a topic in How to's on filing a Claim,
I met with a VSO today at my VA Hospital who was very knowledgeable and very helpful. We decided I should submit a few new claims which we did. He told me that he didn't need copies of my military records that showed my sick call notations related to any of the claims. He said that the VA now has entire military medical record on file and would find the record(s) in their own file. It seemed odd to me as my service dates back to 1981 and spans 34 years through my retirement in 2015. It sure seemed to make more sense for me to give him copies of my military medical record pages that document the injuries as I'd already had them with me. He didn't want my copies. Anyone have any information on this. Much thanks in advance.-
- 4 replies
Picked By
RichardZ, -
-
Caluza Triangle defines what is necessary for service connection
Tbird posted a record in VA Claims and Benefits Information,
Caluza Triangle – Caluza vs Brown defined what is necessary for service connection. See COVA– CALUZA V. BROWN–TOTAL RECALL
This has to be MEDICALLY Documented in your records:
Current Diagnosis. (No diagnosis, no Service Connection.)
In-Service Event or Aggravation.
Nexus (link- cause and effect- connection) or Doctor’s Statement close to: “The Veteran’s (current diagnosis) is at least as likely due to x Event in military service”-
- 0 replies
Picked By
Tbird, -
-
Post in ICD Codes and SCT CODES?WHAT THEY MEAN?
Timothy cawthorn posted an answer to a question,
Do the sct codes help or hurt my disability ratingPicked By
yellowrose, -
-
Post in Chevron Deference overruled by Supreme Court
broncovet posted a post in a topic,
VA has gotten away with (mis) interpreting their ambigious, , vague regulations, then enforcing them willy nilly never in Veterans favor.
They justify all this to congress by calling themselves a "pro claimant Veteran friendly organization" who grants the benefit of the doubt to Veterans.
This is not true,
Proof:
About 80-90 percent of Veterans are initially denied by VA, pushing us into a massive backlog of appeals, or worse, sending impoverished Veterans "to the homeless streets" because when they cant work, they can not keep their home. I was one of those Veterans who they denied for a bogus reason: "Its been too long since military service". This is bogus because its not one of the criteria for service connection, but simply made up by VA. And, I was a homeless Vet, albeit a short time, mostly due to the kindness of strangers and friends.
Hadit would not be necessary if, indeed, VA gave Veterans the benefit of the doubt, and processed our claims efficiently and paid us promptly. The VA is broken.
A huge percentage (nearly 100 percent) of Veterans who do get 100 percent, do so only after lengthy appeals. I have answered questions for thousands of Veterans, and can only name ONE person who got their benefits correct on the first Regional Office decision. All of the rest of us pretty much had lengthy frustrating appeals, mostly having to appeal multiple multiple times like I did.
I wish I know how VA gets away with lying to congress about how "VA is a claimant friendly system, where the Veteran is given the benefit of the doubt". Then how come so many Veterans are homeless, and how come 22 Veterans take their life each day? Va likes to blame the Veterans, not their system.Picked By
Lemuel, -
-
Question
Berta
Eighteen More Veterans Administration Medical Centers Are Under The Ax
By David Robert Crews, Magic City Morning Star, Millinocket, ME 04462
Mar 27, 2006,
Ft. Howard Maryland Veterans Administration Medical Center is the first VA
property that will be turned into a veteran and non-veteran independent,
assisted living and geriatric care housing project. Eighteen more VAMCs are
targeted for the same drastic changes. If you are an American military
veteran, or someone who cares about veterans issues, and one of these VAMCs,
on the list that follows later in this article, is not near your home, is
not your or your loved one's source of medical care, it is still important
for you to be aware of what is happening.
Your VAMC could be next. In my previous article about Ft. Howard VAMC, that
is published here in Magic City News under D.R.Crews, I laid out the facts,
as I and some other American citizens see them, about Ft. Howard and other
Veterans Administration Medical Center properties that the VA has decided to
turn into housing developments for veterans and non-vets.
Property that would be better used for much needed new VA medical
facilities. But the federal government will not give the VA enough funding
so that they can replace their old obsolete hospitals.In recent years, the
VAMC system has been transitioning from inpatient care based services to
outpatient care, as most hospitals have. I understand that this is a well
thought out, planned and implemented change.
How much the lack of sufficient, congressional VAMC funding affected the
train of thoughts of the decision makers, who set those changes into motion,
is your guess as good as mine.My big beef about this transition is, our VA
outpatient care could be provided to us veterans just as well in revamped
VAMCs on spacious, peaceful, beautiful grounds as it can be in a crowded,
dirty, definitely more dangerous downtown environment like where the
Baltimore VA Hospital is.
Also, we veterans should still have plenty of access to quality inpatient
care, when we absolutely need it.The Vietnam Veterans of America, the
Veterans of Foreign Wars, the American Legion and other Veterans Service
Organizations are constantly working and fighting for more VA funding. Many
times, I have read reports of their frustrated attempts to procure
Congressional approval for dispersion of more tax dollars to the VA. Money
that some tax payers agree should go to the VA instead of to the pork barrel
type projects that bring in more votes for the incumbent politicians.
Sometime back in the 1990s, the VA decided to start a process of determining
which prime VA real estate locations could be leased out to housing
developers, supposedly, so that the VA could attain more funding for VA
medical use while making the transition from inpatient to outpatient care
based services. The first VA property to be leased out is Ft. Howard
Maryland VAMC.
That lease is probably already signed.It would have been signed a month ago,
but the property developers, who are going to take over Ft. Howard, sent in
a plan for over a thousand living units and Senator Barbara Mikulski sent it
back to them and told them to stick to the three hundred unit limit that had
been agreed upon earlier. At least that's what I heard from another
concerned veteran who responded to my first VAMC article.
Other local vets and several long time Ft. Howard area residents, whom I
talked to recently, expressed their feelings to me that they are in
agreement with my take on things. They also said that they had been hearing
rumors for decades that land developers were after Ft. Howard to lease it
from the government in order to build expensive homes that have wonderful
views of both the Chesapeake Bay and the entrance to the Port of Baltimore.
This raises at least two questions:What came first, the developer's efforts
to influence politicians, VA and other U.S. Government officials to lease
them beautiful Ft. Howard, or did the VA make a sound medical business
decision to lease out property because of their lack of fair funding to
upgrade those properties to modern medical standards?Did the VA then ponder
the facts and realize that prime properties with beautiful views would have
to be sacrificed for better VA health care?
Even though those beautiful views are from nicely landscaped, well
maintained hospital grounds that VA patients, their visitors and the VA
staff working there make good use of to help relieve the stress of dealing
with often life threatening medical conditions.Some other responders to my
article informed me of the VA's progress in their efforts to lease out more
real estate to property developers.If you web search the word CARES, you
will find the VA's web site that tells the government's side of this story.
It has info on all eighteen VAMCs that are being 'studied' for possible
"realignment". I say 'studied', but I think it is a done deal for taking
great VA real estate for high priced housing that may mostly profit
seemingly conniving, maybe even government official bribing, super wealthy
land developers who may end up grandiosely throwing only teeny, tiny
percentages of their profits towards the VAMC health care system like kings
and queens pitching pennies to beggars.
I am not alone in thinking these thoughts.Then will Congress say to the VA
and veterans health care advocates, "You get less tax dollars from us for
the VA budget this year, because you have all of that lease money from them
housing projects of yours to work with!"What if this prediction of a
significantly higher percentage of housing project profits going to the
developers does come true?
And Congress cuts VA funding too far below what their previous funding was,
and then the tax dollars and those lease dollars combined equal a much worse
VA budget short fall than usual?Will Congress then say to the VA, "It's not
our fought that you have less money in your budget this year, that leasing
deal foul-up is your mistake, so live with it!"Here is a list of the
eighteen Veterans Administration Medical Centers that are under the ax:
Big Spring, TX
Boston, MA
Brooklyn-Manhattan, NY
Canandaiga, NY
Gulfport, MS
Lexington. KY
Livermore, CA
Louisville, KY
Montgomery, AL
Montrose/Castle Point, NY
Muskogee, OK
Perry Point, MD
Poplar Bluff, MO
St. Albans, NY
Waco, TX
Walla Walla, WA
West Los Angeles, CA
White City, OR
Stick with me now, this article details in depth what will be a long, hard
fight for us veterans and our supporters, and why. I have to address as many
points of debate about this issue, that I and others who have communicated
with me about it, can think of. We need to be as fully prepared as we can be
to fight the government and the land developers, who are highly skilled at
imposing their public meeting spoken and official report written rhetoric
upon us.
The CARES web site has information on and links to documented public
meetings, proposals, community input, plans, etc. for each VAMC. Of coarse,
it is the government's version of some things that are relevant to the
issues surrounding these upcoming changes.I didn't look too far into any one
document that is on the web site, but I never saw anything about if anyone
was hootin' and hollerin' at any of the public meetings in outright
opposition to having high priced condominiums where the vets should have new
modern medical facilities built for them.
Built in accordance with the promise of lifetime access to good VA medical
care. A written promise that we vets all received, when we signed on the
dotted line then raised our right hands and swore to defend our country,
democracy and families with our lives and the lives of our enemies, whom we
were soon to be ready, willing and able to kill.One day, when I was in the
Ft. Howard VAMC, a group of us patients were discussing inadequacies in the
VA health care system.
A sympathetic VA employee was listening to us and came over to our table
and, with a heart full of soul, said that it really wasn't us military
service survivors who paid for our veterans benefits, it was our comrades in
arms who died while on duty in the service who paid for them. The employee
said that our fellow service personnel loved us as much as we loved them,
and they all knew that we were all taking the same chances. They had willed
us vets our rights to reasonably good VA health care, that are often denied
us. We VA patients all heartily agreed with that VA employee.
A lady from the Livermore, California area sent me this email:It seems that
VA has a lot of prime property, the VA hospital here in Livermore is outside
of town nettled in the hills where the Veterans can see Deer Wild Turkeys
and other critters it's absolutely beautiful, peaceful and quiet. It too is
on the chopping block to be sold and is going to not only take away property
that the veterans love but will be a big inconvenience to families.
I would like to hear from other people who live near and make good use of
these eighteen VAMCs on the list above. I want to know what the fluctuations
in property values in those areas has been like lately. Are the VAMCs in
nice areas? Is there other developing going on around them? Are they
obsolete as medical facilities? Could they be rebuilt with fair funding? Are
they fully used or underused?
Some VAMCs may not be worth keeping as they are. No doubt about it.But who
will make the decisions on what to keep and what to change? Will it be
possibly bribed or other wise similarly influenced government officials?
Will bullied and befuddled ordinary citizens, who are not schooled in public
debate or legal battles, fare well against wealthy, heartless acting land
developers and their government lackeys and/or other co-conspirators who
have extensive public debating and legal experience?
If you web search "Bayside at Ft. Howard" you will find the new web site
that touts the proposed amenities of their upcoming VAMC housing
development.On the Bayside web site's location page, there are two maps and
one aerial photograph of the Ft. Howard area. These will help you to
understand the upcoming traffic and infrastructure problems that are
particular to this project, which are defined nearly in full in my Ft.
Howard VAMC article.
If you live near one of the eighteen VAMCs on the list printed above, it
will help you to determine the extent, depth and breadth of possible
problems that you will have to endure when the developing begins in your
neighborhood. It may influence you to heed this warning that old,
established Ft. Howard area neighborhoods residents' rights are going to be
run over rough shod by the land developers and that you may be next for the
same lousy treatment.I don't know how much all of this baring of the facts
will do. It at least leaves a true historical record of the opposition to
these afore mentioned changes that many, many people think the same about as
I do.
About all that I can do, at this point in my life, about these VAMC changes,
is to inform as much of the public as I can of what is happening, and why I
and some other folks, who aren't writers, say that it is happening--as
opposed to what the land developer's and the VA's spin on the story is.
Because, I live on a monthly non-service connected VA disability check that
about equals take home pay for a minimum wage job. The web sites that
publish my writings are staffed by volunteers.
The sites only stay afloat through meager advertising revenues and the
efforts of their editors and contributors like me who desire to work as hard
as they are able to, express themselves and have some fun writing short
stories along with serious articles like this one. I am an ex-army and
sometimes civilian photographer, though I never did a whole lot of
photography after my discharge from the army, but that's another story, and
my photo portfolio is mostly in hibernation.
This computer that I write my stuff on is an old, worn down thing, and it
barely runs well enough to stay on the Internet long enough at a stretch to
research and email info about these written articles of mine.I do the best
that I can with what I have to work with, so I hope that you will 'take this
ball and run with it'.I am sending as many emails as I can about these VAMC
articles to politicians, media outlets, Veterans Service Organizations,
community groups, barber shops, etc. that are near the VAMCs on the list.
My writings and email efforts may not change much. I'm up against what is
basically a done deal.But, if I can help ensure fair veterans medical care
compensation for the loss of our beloved, beautiful VA properties, then I
have done something besides sit here watching TV all day while stewing in my
U.S. Government issued disappointment and anger; all the time wondering why
I didn't live-fast-die-young-and-leave a good lookin' corpse--like some of
us were advised to do way back when.
I feel like the guy who defended himself from an armed robber by beating a
reasonable amount of crap outa the criminal and then had to pay the robber's
medical expenses and give the robber money for insult and injury that the
violent nature of the crime warranted, because the crime victim had no
witnesses to back him up.You may be able to help me make more of a
difference though.
Make up and circulate petitions. Write to congress. Write local elected
officials; they will say that it is a federal problem at first, but explain
to them what any VA land developing will mean to your local infrastructure,
school populations, traffic patterns, tax rates, etc., etc.. Attack it from
that direction.Collect stories from local vets and their families about how
the VAMC helped them and whether or not it is in the right place for their
reasonable convenience.
Share that information with your local media.Have town hall meetings that
are set up so that you can get your views heard with significant enough
power that stands up to the VA's and land developer's massive powers.If the
VA property in your area should be developed into housing, try and make sure
that the profits from them are spent on veterans medical care.
Make the developers compensate for the inconveniences to your community that
they will swear is only necessary for the veterans own good.Think of things
to do about it that I could never conceive of doing. And pray.There is very
little chance that any one person, or even a massive portion of the American
population, can do something to stop the government from doing what it wants
to.The United States Government has a long, well documented history of
forgetting exactly who keeps this country free.In 1932, World War
One Veterans tried to get the government to give them promised war bonus
money before they died and while they and their families were starving in
the Great Depression. They camped out in Washington, D.C., along with some
of their destitute family members, and protested for months. They were
called the Bonus Army.Eventually, U.S Army officers Douglas MacArthur and
George S. Patton went into the Bonus Army's encampment with fresh regular
army troops and whupped the tar out of the same men whom they had led into
muddy, bloody hell on earth in Europe during 1917-18, and then burned the
camp.
Some of those poor fellows' impoverished family members were injured in the
tear gas laced, brutal attack.Web search "Bonus Army" and see for
yourself.It was because of the Bonus Army's actions that the GI Bill for
higher education benefits, and housing and business loans was written into
law in 1944. The government was afraid that returning World War Two American
Warriors would be disenchanted with the same crappy lives that they had led
before the war and take over the government.
But don't start an armed revolution, that just tends to make a bad situation
worse.To quote my good friend Tom G., who did two combat tours in Vietnam
and then spent even more time than that later, during the past twenty years,
in a half a dozen VA hospitals, "The government doesn't give anything to
veterans out of the goodness of its heart."In the movie Born On The Fourth
Of July, there are scenes that accurately depict the rat infested, miserable
condition that some VAMCs were in back during the Vietnam War.
But, that aspect of VA health care system inadequacies has changed.Today, VA
hospitals have very high ratings in the medical world. The VAMC system is
jammed packed with patients, not all vets who want in can get in. A short
while back, the Baltimore VAMC put a one year moratorium on accepting new
patients, when thousands of Bethlehem Steel retirees had their pensions
pilfered and their earned lifetime civilian medical coverage confiscated.
Though today's VAMCs are crowded, vets often receive top notch treatment
there.We need more modern VA medical facilities. For the first time in our
history, we have the quality of health care that veterans earned. We do not
have the quantity that we need and earned.Building new medical centers on
VAMC properties using a fair dispensation of tax dollars is what I say
should be done.
One time a fellow hospitalized vet, who was dying of cancer, and I were
sitting on the shore of the Chesapeake Bay/Patapsco River commenting on how
sweet it was to have Ft. Howard VAMC located where we could go outside in
our hospital pajamas and get some fresh air in safety and privacy during our
traumatic medical experience. He looked at me and said, "Ya know why they
put this VA here? Up where I come from in Pennsylvania VA hospitals are all
way up on a hill somewhere or back in where there aren't too many people
around.
The government put us in out of the way places because people don't like to
see how ####ed up some vets are when they come back after wars."I don't
know. Ft. Howard was an old, obsolete army fort and was easily turned into a
VAMC at the beginning of WW II. It was way out in the sticks at the time
though.Now some VAMCs are in developing, sometimes crowded, prime real
estate markets.
The powers that be want to make money off of them.They say that they will
use that money for improving veterans health care.I say that I doubt that us
veterans will get a fair enough share of that money to actually improve our
VA health care services or to reasonably compensate us for the loss of the
healing, safe, peaceful privacy and beauty of VAMCs like the Ft. Howard,
Maryland and Livermore, California locations.
If the lease money from housing developments built on former VA hospital
grounds improves health care for veterans, then I will eat my words in front
of the Washington, D.C. Veterans Administration Regional Office at lunch
time.
David Robert Crews
2727 Liberty Pkwy
Dundalk, Maryland 21222
ursusdave@yahoo.com
http://magic-city-news.com/article_5560.shtml
GRADUATE ! Nov 2nd 2007 American Military University !
When thousands of Americans faced annihilation in the 1800s Chief
Osceola's response to his people, the Seminoles, was
simply "They(the US Army)have guns, but so do we."
Sameo to us -They (VA) have 38 CFR ,38 USC, and M21-1- but so do we.
Link to comment
Share on other sites
Top Posters For This Question
1
1
Popular Days
Mar 30
2
Top Posters For This Question
Pete53 1 post
Berta 1 post
Popular Days
Mar 30 2006
2 posts
1 answer to this question
Recommended Posts