I'll be leading this session, scheduled for 5:30 p.m. Thursday, Aug. 11, at the Carolina Theatre, 310 S. Greene St., just across the street from our offices in downtown Greensboro. Everyone who attends will get a free Deuterman Law Group tote bag, plus tickets to the Carolina Theatre's Summer Film Festival. You can use the tickets for any movie at the theater, including Thursday's 7:30 p.m. showing of "Top Gun."

I'll be explaining the "ins and outs" of this complicated federal program, and I will also answer your questions, as i did during another seminar in February. 

Did you know:

• If you suffer from an injury, physical or mental illness that could keep you out of work for a year, you can and should apply for Social Security Disability benefits.
• You may be able to collect Social Security Disability benefits while recovering from a workplace injury, automobile accident or chronic illness, such as cancer.
• Veterans collecting VA benefits may also apply for and receive Social Security Disability benefits.

Call (866) 373-1130 for more information and reservations.

If, like many people, you have multiple medical problems that, taken together, combine to prevent you from being able to sustain full time work, the Social Security Administration is supposed to look at how all of your different medical problems affect you in a holistic way. In other words, you don’t have to show that one medical problem by itself is severe enough to disable you, if in fact you have several medical problems, none of which by itself would be disabling, but the combination of which is disabling.

The second thing I often tell people is that you usually can’t get a feel for what your chances of getting approved are just by knowing the diagnosis, because most medical problems can affect people in vastly different ways. One person with a given disease might be able to manage it effectively with medication and lifestyle changes, with minimal interference in her life. Another person might be debilitated by the same illness, unable to even take care of her basic needs. Because of this variation, what is most important is how your medical conditions, and the side effects from any treatments you need for your medical conditions, affect you.

That being said, I’d like to highlight a few specific medical conditions that can be the basis of a Social Security Disability case in a series of short posts.

Although it may sound like the Latin name for a particularly nasty beetle, Ankylosing Spondylitis, sometimes shortened to AS, is a type of chronic inflammatory arthritis that causes long term inflammation in the joints of the vertebra, and sometimes other joints.

Ankylosing Spondylitis is in a group of diseases called spondyloarthritis or spondyloarthropathy, which include Psoriatic Arthritis (Phil Mickelson’s arthritis commercials ring a bell?), juvenile spondyloarthropathy, enteropathic arthritis, and reactive arthritis.

The primary symptoms of AS are back pain and stiffness.

Over time, AS can cause fusion of the bones in the vertebra, starting with the SI joints at the bottom of the spine and sometimes spreading all the way up the spine, resulting in a completely fused spine. Historically this condition has been one cause of a permanently stooped posture, or “humpback.”

Fortunately, newer types of medication, most notably drugs that block a specific type of molecule involved in the inflammatory process called TNFa, have showed promise in slowing or stopping the progressive bony fusion associated with AS. Nonetheless, posture exercises are important for anyone with AS, to preserve good posture should bony fusion occur.

The Spondylitis Association of America, a non-profit organization, has lots of great information about Ankylosing Spondylitis and related diseases.

AS is treated by a rheumatologist, who specializes in arthritic conditions. The chronic pain and stiffness associated with AS can be debilitating and can prevent full time work, and as such can form the basis of a claim for Social Security Disability.

47-year-old Heather Russell was diagnosed a year ago with Stage IV cancer and applied for Social Security disability benefits. She was initially denied benefits, and so kept working at her job at Home Depot despite the toll the end-stage cancer was taking on her.

Russell died before receiving Social Security Disability benefits. And it wasn't until a few weeks before her death that her family learned that her claim likely could have been expedited because of her terminal condition.

It wasn't until recently, with the help of staff from Congresswoman Carol Shea-Porter's Dover office, that the Russells learned Social Security provides "compassionate allowances," according to the agency, in order to "quickly target the most obviously disabled individuals for allowances based on objective medical information that we can obtain quickly."

But Heather Russell received no compassionate allowance. And she died while her Social Security Disability claim was mired in red tape.

Russell's family says that her final months could have been so much easier had her disability benefits been approved. She wouldn't have had to continue to work and to worry about how to pay her rent and other bills.

Heather Russell's story is a sad reminder of why the Social Security Disability system is sorely in need of reform.

Moved by a huge tide of troops returning from Iraq and Afghanistan with post-traumatic stress, Congress has pressured the Department of Veterans Affairs to settle their disability claims — quickly, humanely, and mostly in the vets' favor.

The problem: The system is dysfunctional, an open invitation to fraud. And the VA has proposed changes that could make deception even easier.

As someone who has represented countless disabled and injured workers, this article was interesting on two fronts. I know how difficult it can be to prove disability from certain hard-to-prove conditions, and certainly PTSD ranks as one. And I also know that there's a huge public bias against people who are collecting disability or workers' comp benefits; there's a sense that many of these people are faking it.

While there are cases where fraudsters manipulate the system to collect benefits not due them, it's much more common for someone who is entitled to benefits to not receive them. I suspect that's also the case with disabled veterans.

The AP article cited three examples of fraudulent PTSD claims:

• Gulf War veteran Felton Lamar Gray told a VA psychologist he was spattered with "blood and chunks of head" when his "best friend" was shot in the face in Iraq. But only after the VA rated Gray 100 percent disabled did anyone check into his stories — and discover the comrade he spoke of is very much alive and said he barely knew Gray.
• Thomas James Barnhart is a Coast Guard veteran who used forged documents to convince VA doctors he was an elite, much-decorated Navy SEAL. Barnhart's tales of daring rescues and of cradling a dying helicopter pilot in his arms won a congressman to his cause and helped him get a 30 percent PTSD disability rating from the VA, before he was outed by a watchdog group.
• Vietnam-era veteran Keith Roberts said he was traumatized when he was prevented from rescuing a friend being crushed under a Navy airplane, and was eventually granted 100 percent disability. But when the case was reopened, investigators could find no evidence that Roberts was even present when the accident occurred.

But don't let those examples cloud the reality. PTSD is a very real and very debilitating condition affecting hundreds of thousands of veterans. The VA should be applauded for its efforts to more quickly and favorably settle these disability claims.

PTSD is an undeniably real sickness whose symptoms — flashbacks, vivid nightmares, intrusive thoughts, exaggerated startle response, emotional numbness — can be debilitating. As of Fiscal Year 2009, nearly 390,000 veterans were receiving benefits for PTSD, making it the fourth-most prevalent service-connected disability, according to the VA.

Authorities have tried to brace the public for a tidal wave of psychically damaged veterans from the current wars. Of the roughly 1.6 million troops who have served in the war zones of Afghanistan and Iraq, more than 134,000 had been seen at VA health care facilities for "potential PTSD" as of late last year, according to a government report. Researchers suggest the numbers of actual sufferers are much higher.

Veterans groups have sued the VA over an enormous backlog, complaining that claims take months and even years to be approved, and that some veterans had committed suicide as a result.

 

Statistics showing how deep the backlog is -- as much as two years in some cases -- are compelling. But it's stories like that of Kevin Smith of Spindale, N.C., that illustrate why reform and improvements to the Social Security Disability system are so necessary.

Because of a bureaucratic mistake -- a computer coding error -- Smith failed to receive $14,000 in back pay after being approved for Social Security Disability benefits for his chronic neck and back problems.

It wasn't until a local  television station made an inquiry that Smith got his money.

This TV station apparently gets a lot of request for help from Social Security Disability applicants for help regarding their claims. Their number one bit of advice (it's ours too): Hire an attorney to assist with your clam. 

Our attorneys and paralegals at the Deuterman Law Group know the Social Security Disability system inside and out, and we've handled countless cases. We know how to deal with the bureaucracy to get our clients the benefits that they deserve in as prompt a manner as possible.

According to a report at NJ.com, a new survey from Allsup reveals:

The average New Jerseyan will wait as long as 16 months before a hearing to determine whether they are eligible for benefits. Although that’s an improvement from more than 17 months in September 2008, it’s still the 13th longest wait in the country. Reviewing the first two applications in New Jersey takes an average of six months, said Kevin Smith, spokesman for the state Department of Labor and Workforce Development. That makes the full wait for New Jersey residents as long as 22 months before the entire process is completed.

As we've written here before, the Social Security disability backlog is a real hardship for disabled workers. Most initial claims are denied, and it's the norm that people will wait a year, if not two, for a hearing and receipt of benefits. In that time, the bills pile up and their financial situations worsen.

The Social Security Administration is attempting to cut the backlog by hiring more administrative law judges, but the problem is far from fixed.

Nationally, the average wait time for a hearing and decision on SSDI benefits is 442 days, down from 514 days in September 2008.

As bad as things are in New Jersey, they're worse in other states.

Allsup's analysis found that the Social Security Disability backlog was longest in Ohio, Michigan, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Indiana, Nebraska, Illinois, Missouri, the District of Columbia and Alabama.

An individual with a disability who lives in Delaware will wait on average fewer than 10 months for a hearing, while the same applicant in Ohio would wait almost 20. The 10 states with the lowest wait times are Delaware, Maine, Texas, Louisiana, West Virginia, Utah, Massachusetts, Oklahoma, Connecticut and Hawaii.

As you can imagine, many people's opinions are a result of their own experience with the health care system, insurance, Medicare and Medicaid.

55-year-old Deborah Russell, who lives on Social Security and relies on Medicaid to pay her medical bills, favors reform.

Russell says too many hardworking people she knows - including a 49-year-old mechanic who rents a room in the same two-story house where she lives - have no insurance. "When he got sick two weeks ago, I gave him Tamiflu and some aspirin, but he didn't go to the doctor," she said of her neighbor. Any health care reform has to ensure some low-cost option for young and middle-aged adults who may need health care, Russell said.

You can read her complete story here.

The trend continues, according to the Las Vegas Sun:

Since October, the number of people waiting to have a claim processed has jumped more than 30 percent, from about 556,000 to 736,000 last month. Although most of those initial claims will be denied, many will end up before an administrative law judge on appeal. Nearly 750,000 people are waiting for a hearing before overwhelmed judges.

Now  according to the newspaper, there's evidence that some overloaded administrative law judges, who hear Social Security Disability cases on appeal, are being forced to take shortcuts to meet quotas.

The Social Security Administration requires that administrative law judges hear 500 to 700 cases a year, which many judges are saying is an unrealistic caseload. The growing backlog is making the burden even harder to bear.

Ultimately, disabled workers are suffer and will continue to suffer until the system is overhauled.

“No one ever says, ‘do a sloppy job,’ ” said Marilyn Zahm, executive vice president of the Association of Administrative Law Judges. “But to pretend you can keep pumping out decision after decision and spend the requisite amount of time on each case is foolish. That’s shortchanging people, and the system will lack integrity if you do not require everyone to do a good job.”

“Corners are being cut in order to accommodate a backlog and at the end of the day everyone is going to suffer,” she said. “People have a right to expect due process ... At a certain point, no more corners can be cut.”

The fear, she said, is that legitimate claims may be rejected or fraudulent claims accepted in the rush to do business.

Indeed, the pressure and disciplinary threats have caused some judges to take shortcuts, Zahm said.

“Hearings are being shortened, not all information in the file is being reviewed, not all medical reports are being obtained, and full and legally defensible decisions may not be rendered, either because due consideration hasn’t been given or the decision is poorly written,” she said. “When people have too much work to do in the amount of time allotted to do it, you get sloppy work.”

The Social Security Disability can't continue to function this way. If the system isn't overhauled -- if more administrative law judges aren't hired and trained -- to hear cases, more legitimate claims will be denied. And disabled people will have to go through multiple layers of appeals before receiving the benefits to which they're entitled.

Tommy Thompson, a 41-year-old Albermarle man, has a doozy of a tale regarding his experiences with the Social Security Administration.

Thompson, who was born with a partial arm on one side and no arm on the other, started collecting $700 per month in Social Security Disability payments six years ago. Two years ago, Thompson got a teaching job and informed the Social Security Administration to discontinue his payments.

But Social Security told him by law the payments had to continue for nine months in case the job didn't work out. Then in December SSA told him they'd overpaid him $192.

Thompson thought he'd gotten the mess straightened out after visiting his local Social Security office and meeting with an employee there who told him he didn't owe the money after all.

But four months later, another bill arrived for $722.

Turns out that one was a mistake too.

For the moment, it looks like the matter is settled and Thompson won't be asked again to repay any money to the Social Security Administration.

But you never know...

For Thompson's full story and to watch an interview about his experiences, visit WSOC Action 9.

Among the findings of the Allsup Disability Study: Income at Risk:

• For the second quarter of 2009, people with disabilities experienced an unemployment rate 53 percent higher than people without disabilities, according to data from the U.S. Department of Labor.
• In June,  three in 10 of the unemployed had been jobless for 27 weeks or more, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistic.
• Disability applications rose to more than 727,000 in the second quarter of 2009, up 7 percent from the first quarter. Year to date there has been a 22-percent jump in initial disability applications compared to the same period in 2008.

An increase in the number of applications for Social Security Disability benefits impacts the Social Security Administration's ability to process those claims, delaying the assignment of benefits. Most claimants wait an average of 2 1/2 years for their Social Security benefits, but for some the backlog can stretch the wait to four years.

That's why it's so important to apply for benefits as soon as you become disabled. It's customary to be denied benefits initially, and it's often that point that  people seek a qualified and experienced Social Security Disability attorney to help with their claim.

Applying for SSDI is a lengthy process and most claims are initially denied.

Paul Proto, who has been representing Social Security Disability claimants for more than 30 years, offers an insider's view into what it takes to get a Social Security Disability benefits claim approved.

Claims for Social Security disability benefits succeed, for the most part, on the state of the medical documentation contained in the claim file. There should be a clearly stated list of diagnoses provided by the treating physicians that interfere with full-time work activity. The record should contain medical test results that support the diagnoses. Social Security regulations refer to these as “medically acceptable objective, clinical and laboratory findings”. A person alleging back pain should be able to provide x-ray evidence of some level of disc degeneration. Someone suffering from rheumatoid arthritis can have blood studies consistent with that diagnosis. This might include positive ANA or “antinuclear antibodies”. Heart conditions that cause chest pain may demonstrate lack of oxygen to the heart (ischemia) through stress treadmill tests or EKG’s.

Regardless of the diagnosis, there should be some supporting documentation of a condition that can reasonably result in a condition that can cause the reported symptoms. This combination of symptoms and medical documentation of a condition that can cause those symptoms is only part of the equation however.

We know from experience that this can be a confusing and disappointing process for most sick and disabled people. That's why it's important to have a qualified Social Security Disability attorney or representative on your side, advocating for you to ensure that you get the benefits you deserve.

Most applications are denied the first time, and it often takes several rounds of appeals before a disabled person can begin collecting benefits. It's not unusual for people to wait a year or two to be approved.

Imagine what would happen if you were sick or disabled for a year or two, unable to work, with no money coming in. How would you pay for medical treatment? How would you pay your rent or mortgage? How would you cover your bills?

How many people are just one paycheck away from homelessness?

Consider the story of Maggie Dato, a disabled California woman out of work, evicted from her home, denied Social Security Disability benefits, facing mounting medical bills and living out of a camping trailer that she is about to lose.

Unfortunately, more people from all walks of like can probably identify with Deto these days. Mass layoffs have left hundreds of thousands out of work, and many are struggling to pay their bills and provide for their families even if they're receiving unemployment benefits. If they're struggling, how can injured and disabled people who can't work and who aren't receiving any benefits make it?

"A Freedom of Information Act request, federal reports and interviews showed the Carolinas had about 48,500 pending disability cases, including about 8,700 in the Charlotte area. Waits at Charlotte's Disability and Adjudication and Hearing Office ranked among the worst -- 125 out of 141 offices in the nation.

The reason: Charlotte administrative law judges, on average, decided 375 cases in 2006. The Social Security Administration asks judges to make 500 to 600 decisions a year.

Though officials tried to remove reporters from the hearing office, the Observer spent more than 40 hours monitoring workers. At any given time, half of the six courtrooms were not in use.

Judges blamed the problems on staffing. The Social Security Administration has since announced it is hiring more judges to reduce delays. "

But hiring more judges isn't the solution for ending the Social Security disability backlog. As Paul M. Goodson, a colleague who practices in Charlotte, pointed out, the judges can't hear more cases unless the Social Security Administration also hires more staff to assist them.

The inefficiency runs through the entire Social Security system. The blame can't be laid solely at the feet of the judges.

Dan Neer, a 38-year-old North Dakota man who injured his back moving furniture learned this the hard way: It took him more than two years from his first application to get Social Security disability benefits.

Lawmakers are also starting to notice the backlog. Sen. Byron Dorgan, D-N.D., has asked President Bush and the inspector general's office to review the process of applying for disability.

"There seems to be something wrong if two-thirds on appeal are found disabled," Dorgan said.

"We must stop the inexcusable delay in getting Social Security benefits to people with disabilities.

Hundreds of thousands of people who have filed legitimate disability claims with the Social Security Administration have been forced to wait, on average, an astonishing 520 days for a hearing on their claims. Many have waited as long as three years, losing their homes in the process."

Amen. Read on for Ervin's thought-provoking article about the Social Security backlog.

"[Monday's] front-page New York Times story highlighting the human toll of the growing backlogs in our Social Security Disability Insurance system is a stark reminder that Congress and the President must act immediately to address this problem," Clinton said. "I have for several years been calling on this Administration to adequately fund the Social Security Administration to ensure that people with disabilities and retirees can access the benefits they deserve. "

• Since 2000, the backlog of cases has soared from 311,000 to 755,000
• Most applicants now wait 500 days for an appeals hearing, twice as long as in 2000, when the wait was 258 days.

What can be done to reduce the backlog and help disabled people get benefits they deserve sooner? The answer is simple really. Hire more appeals judges.

The Social Security Administration has plans to do so, but for now, the money is not there. As The Time's article points out, "the agency’s new plan to hire at least 150 new appeals judges to whittle down the backlog...will require $100 million more than the president requested this year and still more in the future. The plan has been delayed by the standoff between Congress and the White House over domestic appropriations."

Of course, the way that the SSD process is structured also contributes to the backlog. In order to be approved for benefits, a claimant must prove that their physical or mental disabilities prevent them for doing any kind of substantial work or otherwise prove that an illness is expected to result in death.

As we've blogged before, most social security disabilty claims are rejected initially, and many people find it helpful to get an attorney involved at this stage. Because of the backlog, we always encourage people to apply for benefits as soon as they become disable and unable to work.

To find out more about the Social Security Disability claims process, check out the Deuterman Law Group's Web site.

While waiting for Social Security benefits can be stressfully and a huge emotional drain, there is good news at the end of the battle.

Though two-thirds of people are denied benefits upon initial application, two-thirds of people who pursue their claim through the appeals process end up being rewarded benefits. But for many people, the long wait has devasting consequences.

The Times also published an editorial about the Social Security delays yesterday that called out President Bush for vetoing a spending bill that would have given more money to the underfunded Social Security Administration and perhaps would have made a dent in the backlog.

"Last month, Congress passed a $151 billion health, education and labor spending bill that would have given the Social Security Administration $275 million more than the president requested, enough to hire a lot more judges and provide other vital services. But Mr. Bush vetoed that bill as profligate."

The New York Times has an extensive library of articles about the Social Security Administration and the Social Security Disability backlog. I encourage you to check it out. Click on the following link to read more about Social Security disability benefits.

An orphan who's now on a fixed income and disability is being asked to refund money paid to him 30 years ago by the Social Security Administration.

Jay Rovang, 50, got a letter from the Social Security Administration saying it wants to collect benefits it overpaid him totaling $662.

View the full, bizarre story about Rovang's Social Security Survivor benefits at the KETV Web site.

This story highlights an interesting, but perhaps little known fact: The Social Security Administration puts no time limit on collecting overpayments.

The Charlotte Observer newspaper interviewed more than 40 current and former Social Security Disability applicants across the region, and more than half described their visits to the doctor as hasty, inadequate or unusual.

"One applicant said a physician tried to persuade her to become a Seventh-day Adventist.  Another said he suffered heart problems, but the doctor never bothered to check his heart."

This a particularly heart-wrenching story because for many people, applying for medical disability is the last step before bankruptcy and losing everything they have.