C&p Today, Examiner Took All Mrs + Dbq, Letters.

[Greg88]

I went for my Medical C&P today, the examiner was pleasant and asked to see and accepted all my paperwork including medical records, filled out DBQ and Nexis type letter filled out by my private MD. She looked over all the forms before she started questioning me and told me she would review furthur after the exam. She did a thorough exam, but seemed a little more interested in the new things that have popped up in the last 15 years. I will wait a week and see if I can get a copy, overall I think it went OK, she mentioned that they have a person who collects all the MRs and info and brings it back to the Regional Office, this sounds like something new, most of the posts I see, the examiner will read it and hand it back to the vet.

Greg

[Greg88]

Hi Everyone,

I called down the DAV today after checking to see if I could pick up a copy of my C&Ps from the VAMC (they said I could there complete now), of course no one answers the phone at the DAV office, checked my status at Ebenefits and status went from Gathering to review of evidence, I'm wondering if DAV gave the VA the documentation I gave to them, because at this point I don't have a single DAV SO I can rely on, a different one calls back each time. I'll pick up my C&Ps on Friday as see what the examiners wrote.

Greg

[Berta]

"I'm wondering if DAV gave the VA the documentation I gave to them,"

I used to have DAV and another vet org as reps.

Regardless of what I gave them, I also sent copies of it to the VARO and always obtained a Priority Mail tracking slip that I could download from the USPS tracking site, to verify the VARO actually got my stuff.

You said:

"with the VA you always have to look for a curve ball" and that is true. That is why a proper VCAA letter is so important and why we must make sure they have and consider all of our evidence.

I call the curve ball ,the potential 'land mines' we must be aware of, meaning ,what could VA suddenly pop up with to negate the potential of a proper award.

They set me up for a land mine scenario many years ago to deny my DIC claim. It was a completely unexpected , startling and very upsetting statement from a C & P doctor, that had absolutely no basis in medical fact.

I was so upset and angry I called the C & P doctor up, only to find to my dismay and to his astonishment, that the RO had not given him a critical piece of my medical evidence.I guess it was a 'coincidence' that , they gave him the complete C file and med recs but somehow removed this critical document.*(yeah right)

Knowing they could pull anything they wanted to,in a denial, without this document, I had sent it to VA 12 times,figuring they could not misplace or lose every submission of it. I foresaw a curve ball-landmine potential but never dreamed ,with the evidence I had sent, that they would stoop so low. The statement the doctor made still horrifies me. He regretted it, when he became aware of the critical evidence VARO had withheld from hm.

I succeeded in that claim but many years later I enclosed copies of dozens and dozens of USPS tracking slips with my H VAC testimony, to prove that our evidence ,as claimants, had often been manipulated, lost, or removed from our claims files. This was during the Shreddergate fiasco.

Those days are over. Still we must assess our claims for curve balls and landmines ourselves, as the VA can often provide a good rationale for denials , that we are not prepared to question.

Sometimes the VA is right too.

If they legitimately don't receive our evidence, either from our POAs or us, and that evidence is probative to the claim,then we cant blame them for a denial. We MUST be proactive.

Every time I submitted additional evidence to VA,I kept a running evidence list at the bottom of each submission.

[Greg88]

Berta I'm picking up copies of the C&P Friday and will head down to the RO on Mon. I'm bringing copies of everything to hand in to RO, while I'm there, I want DAV to show me whats been given to the VA, DAV has my POA and the RO is right across the hall from them. But the DAV so far on this little adventure has not done much and just kept giving me false reassurances. My DAV rep in JULY told me because I missed a scheduled C&P (I was away when the appt. came and went) the VA was going reduce me from 100% to 0%. This is the same rep that I called when I got a letter from the VA in Jan. telling me I was going to reexamined. The DAV rep said "don't worry those letters were sent out by mistake" I stopped worrying and bang C&P came and went. The funny thing is I told the DAV I was going to my Congresswoman and a panic set in "no no you don't have to that". The thing is I never received any letter telling me that I was going to be reduced. It will be interesting to see what was written on the C&P.

Greg