Chronic Pain

[chamilton]

hello all and Happy Holidays,

I have a active claim for Chronic Pain, I submitted it on Sept 30,2019 and according to ebenfits has a est. completion date of jan 20th 2020.  

My question is who of you have been awarded this claim, I didn't know anything about it my vep rep suggested i do it since i have a 10 yr history of pain and treatments, meds, xray, mri, injections pt ect.

I know they don't have a specific rating code for it and it goes under Mental DIsorder. if you have gotten a award for it what did you receive and do you think it was a fair rating.  My vet rep seems to think this will be no less then 50% . Thank you all.

[broncovet]

Predicting what a decision maker will do, is like predicting the weather.  I would say its a coin toss.  

Is this pain disorder affecting your work?  

[Buck52]

I yet to see a veterans claim get compensation for Chronic Pain alone?

VA is suppose to pay comp for pain and depending on the rated # or how bad your pain is..do they rate pain by the numbers?

I mean they are always asking on a scale from 1-10   how bad would you say your pain is?

  is a No. 7 pain going to get you a 10% rate   or is a # 10 pain going to get you a 20% rate?

I have not heard or seen a Veteran get a rating for Pain Alone.

[Buck52]

VA does not have a specific diagnostic code or rating criteria for chronic pain. To receive VA disability benefits for chronic pain, the symptoms caused by the chronic pain disorder must be ratable. In other words, VA assigns ratings based on the functional impact from the service-connected condition.

Source: CCK Law

[ShrekTheTank]

As Broncovet stated above there is no way to know what direction the RO will go.  The issue you have here is the same one I had and they finally ended with Fibro-Dercum's disease and rated me separately for both of them.  One thing they will look at is your work and how it affects it.

They will also look at the pain medication you are taking or topical pain relief.

They will also look to see how many hospital visits you have for that condition.

Once they have this then It is a crap shoot on what diagnostic code they give you and this could be good or it could pin you into a corner.  

Like with mine I had to take it to the BVA to get the correct rating and even then they messed up and combined another condition with it.

So there is no way to know what will happen, but once you have your letter we can help you fight it!

[Buck52]

What I don't understand is how does the VA figure out just how bad the pain is  do they take a Veterans word on it?  I think not.

Example ,Veterans that have chronic PTSD sure Most seek counseling and therapy  and some don't , but most of these Veterans Including my self we have Pain and its a pain that is hard to describe emotional pain, pain from trying to cope with this mental illness..ect,,ect,,,

The stress and anxiety attacks are painful like having a damn heart attact, literally feel like your going to die or pass out and there  is emotional pain also that leads to physical pain.

So does the VA Go by the rated disease? is a S.C. rated 10% PTSD PAIN going to get you 10%  For the pain it causes? or is a  50% rated condition going to get you a 50% rating   or a 70% rating going to get you a 70% rating for pain???

Edited December 22, 2019 by Buck52

[Buck52]

chamilton 

''My vet rep seems to think this will be no less then 50% ''

Maybe your vet rep knows more than most of us here?

how does he/.she knows this you will get a 50% rating for pain?

where does he get this Information?