ptsd Have You Been Denied Because It Was Too Long Since Service?

[broncovet]

Has your claim been denied and the reasons and bases states "too long since military service"? According to a well known attorney representing Veterans, this is an "invalid reason".

In her knoll, Ms Eagle points out that this is NOT a valid reason.

http://knol.google.com/k/katrina-eagle#

In it she states:

For veterans of World War II (yes, they too have their VA claims denied), Korea and Vietnam, the VA loves to deny the claim on grounds that too much time has passed between the veteran's period of service and their claim for benefits, that it's impossible for their to be a relationship between the two.

For many Gulf War veterans, their medical conditions get stuck in the quagmire of "Gulf War Syndrome"; of course, this may soon improve in light of new recognition by the medical community that GWS is a valid medical condition, but only time will tell.

For veterans of OEF/OIF, the VA refuses to believe these young men and women may actually be too disabled to be employable, so many of them face VA proposals to reduce their monthly VA benefits.

And of course, for veterans of any era with what I call a "squishy" medical condition (that is, one that is not observable by the human eye or objective medical test such as an x-ray, a PFT, etc.) -- PTSD is a perfect example -- their claims are routinely denied for any myriad reasons.

All of these are invalid reasons for the VA to deny the veteran's claim. I just hope the veteran doesn't accept the VA's rejection of their claim and give up.

end of Katrina Eagle quote.

To Katrina's opinion, I would add that the VA is required to follow its own regulations and to rate on the applicable criteria, and not to make it up as they go. If a Veteran has been denied for an invalid reason, I would humbly recommend they file a NOD disputing said denial.

[Hoppy]

There is a lot of wiggle room on the issue of chronic and the VA raters often use the criteria in paragraph three below to disregard a doctor's use of the word chronic. Also, they will do a complete post service history and use intercurrent causes to deny a claim

.____________________________________________________

A disorder also may be service connected if the evidence of record reveals the veteran currently has a disorder that was chronic in service or, if not chronic, that was seen in service with continuity of symptomatology demonstrated thereafter. 38 C.F.R. § 3.303(b); Savage v. Gober, 10 Vet. App. 488, 494-97 (1997).

Subsequent manifestations of the same chronic disease at any later date, however remote, are service connected, unless clearly attributable to intercurrent causes. Id.

For the showing of chronic disease in service there is required a combination of manifestations sufficient to identify the disease entity, and sufficient observation to establish chronicity at the time, as distinguished from merely isolated findings or a diagnosis including the word "chronic." Continuity of symptomatology is required where the condition noted during service is not, in fact, shown to be chronic or where the diagnosis of chronicity may legitimately be questioned. When the fact of chronicity in service is not adequately supported, then a showing of continuity after discharge is required to support the claim. 38 C.F.R. § 3.303.

Sometimes the raters misuse the lack of observation over time to deny a claim and the only way to rebut it is to get an IMO explaining to the raters why the condition in the military was properly diagnosed as being chronic.

Edited November 16, 2011 by Hoppy