Non Combat Medic

[diver]

Hello all. I have been reading this sight for years now and this is my first post. I have been diagnosed with PTSD by the VA. I was a medical specialist 91B10 at Ft Hood in the early 90s. I was assigned to a forward support battalion and spent around 6 months out of the year pulling medical coverage for the tankers. I also had rotations at a troop medical clinic and I have worked on a lot of people. I have many nightmares of these people constantly. Just to give you an idea of what I have seen. I had a cook that was refueling one of the field stoves and she ended up catching herself on fire in front of me. She ended up with some small injuries and smoke inhalation. It is the fire ball that still bothers me today. I have also had a patient that ran under stairs and hit his head causing him to split his scalp from ear to ear and pull the scalp behind his head. I had a helicopter loose power on me at night as I was with a patient heading back to post from a field problem. The emergency red lights flashing and the pilots panicking before they were able to start the engines again. I also had a patient come in that had his eye slashed open from a cable that snapped as he was pulling an engine out of a tank. I do not have any dates for these issues. I worked on so many people that I don’t remember all of them.

I am always depressed, Panicked, stressed, avoid people and places, I avoid my own family and I see my friend from before my service time maybe once a year. I do work because I cant let my kids suffer with loosing there home. I am not worth them having to loose things because of me. My psyche has insisted to me that they do not need to verify them anymore. Also my DAV rep seems to not be interested in adding this to me existing depression and anxiety claim.

My question is. I have put in for disability for this because my psyche told me that I needed to but is there really a possibility of receiving it with no dates for the stressor verification.

[diver]

Thank you for your reply Navy 4life. I have only been diagnosed with PTSD by the VA. I have a claim in for service connection for it now and I have a C&P exam on the 24^th. As for my stressors I have too many to list because I was a field medic for the 1^st Calvary division at fort hood Texas from 93 to 95. I had a cook burst into flames in front of me when she was refueling a field stove. She was not injured much because the fire was out quickly. I had a helicopter that was flying a patient and I back to post at night that lost power and it took the pilots what seemed like a very long time to restart the engines. I have no idea how long it took or how far we fell before they managed to get it restarted. I also had a person when I was working in the TMC come in with his eye slashed open and had the jell rolling down his face. Also at the clinic I had an acquaintance of mine that lived in the barracks with me come in and he had hit his head and split his scalp from ear to ear and pulled it behind his head. I have had more things than I would like to admit. As a medic in a forward support battalion I was always working on real world injuries there was really no standard field problems. I did and worked on way to many people and I can’t stop seeing their faces.

Diver

[Navy4life]

Okay so you have been diagnosed by the VA for PTSD through obviously a MH evaluation. I was in a similar situation - got out in 1996 and applied for C&P in May 2013. I went to MH in June of this year via walk-in clinic and that is where the ball started rolling for me. I had a MH claim in for my Eating Disorder/Anxiety but after my walk-in visit and disclosing some info my MH claim was changed by the VA to include PTSD (secondary to personal assault).

Fast forward today - I am currently in PFD according to Ebennies. My last C&P exam in October 2014 was for PTSD (secondary to military assault) and my MH Eating Disorder claim. I am close to being finished now.

I do not think I am going to be S/C for PTSD after reading my C&P exam (which is in a thread in the C&P forum) but I will be S/C for MST due to another mental disorder. My eating disorder looks to be a solid S/C b/c the C&P exam for that shows my diagnose in 1992 and I was on AD at the time.

Where I am going with this is that you might not have PTSD but can be S/C under MH for other disorders and the main disorder will be your overall MH rating.

Edited November 5, 2014 by Navy4life

[diver]

Thank you. I had PTSD added to my claim for severe depression and anxiety due to my service connected pain. I have SC for my knees, back & ankles. I am a total of 60% for those and tinnitus. I have diagnoses for the depression and anxiety but they put it caused by my PTSD. I have also filed for chronic pain due to my service connections. However I feel that it is in my best interest to file for all that I have and let the rater decide what to rate me under. I do understand that they will only rate 1 MH issue but from what I understand and correct me if I am wrong they will service connect you for all MH that apply and will give you the highest rating out of them.

[diver]

I am still interested if it is worthwhile to have my wife submit a letter of support for my stressors without her actually witnessing the events. We were married at the time and she witnessed the after effects of them.

[Navy4life]

My thought is that you should have a claim in for MH (depression, anxiety) - PTSD is not necessarily a given and with you having the stressors of depression/anxiety and if you can prove they were from AD I would venture to say that you have a good leg to stand on pertaining to a MH claim.

MH can have multiple stressors under the rating but the one with the highest % will be the primary if I am correct - you can have several other stressors with % under MH

[DDuck]

I do not think anyone can answer about the wife support letter, but I can tell you what I was told by a VSO who has been doing claims for awhile.

Letters of support by family are neutral to the case because the family stands to benefit if you benefit; so they really cannot be taken into account.

I do not know if this is true or not but it made sense to me so I did not submit my wifes statements. Buddy statements however can help from what I was told.