Trying To Do My Claim But The Va Does Not Have My Records.

[Cm Burns]

I filed a pension compensation claim for service connected dissability in October. I got a letter from the va saying they do not have my records that are lost. i do not have a copy of them myself but have given them the info from all the civilian doctors I say. I wanted to know if anyone had any reference to people having this situation. Know of anyone with a similar situation that was still rewarded. I am not sure if there is anything else I need to do. Please let me know.

[rotorhead]

This is going to need some work on you your part. I also was told that my Medical records were missing. Start at the last time you know for sure that you know where they were. Then work backwards. I finially found my in Waco, TX at the VA Medical Center. If you exhaust all means to find them and they still don't exesist. The VA is suppose to lean towards your account of things. But don't hold you breath. It will help you on appeal if it get to that.

[Berta]

If they mean the Service Medical Records -if I were you I would go to the NARA web site and click on the veteran's records area and make a request yourself on line woth a SF 180 (the site will take you step by step on the form)

Have you applied for SSA benefits in the last few months ?

The SSA office where you applied might well have your missing records-medical as well as military.

VA told us they had no record of my husband's treatment at Newark VA where he was diagnosed with PTSD in 1983.

Wheh he applied for SSA, we went to their Corning office a few weeks later with some paperwork they needed and here was an enormous stack of his records-to include all mil records (2 periods of service) ,private med recs and the VA med recs from Newark-which Buffalo VARO said were not in existence.

It pays to try to find them yourself when VA says they cant find them.

[LarryJ]

I filed a pension compensation claim for service connected dissability in October. I got a letter from the va saying they do not have my records that are lost. i do not have a copy of them myself but have given them the info from all the civilian doctors I say. I wanted to know if anyone had any reference to people having this situation. Know of anyone with a similar situation that was still rewarded. I am not sure if there is anything else I need to do. Please let me know.

You say that you received a letter from the Va saying that they do not have your records that are lost. Which records are you speaking of (your medical records? your service treatment records? your military service records?)? Give me a clue as to what records you are speaking of.

According to which records, they could be in several different places, different archives, etc.

Do you have anyone helping you with your claim?

[ATVer]

I'm in the same boat, the V.A. regional office called me and said they never got my SMR's. So i guess not lost just never had them to begin with? But i can't get ahold of anyone who knows anything. Hmmm surprise surprise.

[jerrbilly]

Same here, original claim put in in 2003 and the VA has made numerous attempts to obtain my SMR's but no success. They granted my first claim and gave me increased benefit of the doubt due to no SMR's.

I'm in the same boat, the V.A. regional office called me and said they never got my SMR's. So i guess not lost just never had them to begin with? But i can't get ahold of anyone who knows anything. Hmmm surprise surprise.

[Vync]

Interesting. Back in 1995, the VA denied all of my claims due to lack of SMR's. That tends to happen when a blank folder is sent to the RO for review. No benefit of the doubt for me, but I wound up getting SC eventually with retro, so it had a happy ending.