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Hi, welcome. Today we're going to talk about what to expect at a compensation and pension examination or C&P exam for depression. Matt did you want to get us started by talking about what
are C&P exams for depression? Yeah so if you filed a claim for service-connected depression VA will
most likely schedule a CMP exam to evaluate your condition CMP exams are medical exams
ordered by the Department of Veterans Affairs to evaluate the conditions that a veteran is claiming
for disability compensation this is a part of the va's duty to assist veterans in obtaining
evidence to support their disability claim for depression CMP exams for depression are meant
to assess the etiology and or severity of the veterans mental health condition
it is important to know what is being evaluated at your CMP exam some questions you may want to
ask are is the examiner attempting to determine the etiology or cause of the depression in order
to establish service connection or are they are they helping to establish the severity of the
depression in order to determine your rating or maybe a combination of the two as well
VA will most likely always give more weight to the diagnosis of the CMP examiner than your
treating doctors so CMP exams are an incredibly important piece of the disability claims process
so another thing to discuss is how does va evaluate depression during this VA examination
so I think it's important to know that before the examination The Examiner should be reviewing the
Veteran's entire VA claim style and looking for any evidence that is related to depression during
the examination then the medical examiner will ask the veteran questions about their symptoms
of depression and or the relationship to service or service connected condition if the veteran
is still seeking or going for service connection most of the time the examination will be following
a disability benefits questionnaire or sometimes called a DBQ in order to complete the examination
this contains check boxes for certain symptoms of depression it's used to standardize language to
evaluate the disability in accordance with these rating criteria and result in a faster review of
the condition IT addresses the veterans level of Social and occupational impairment in accordance
with va's rating criteria it will go over how the impairment ranges from no diagnosis to a total
occupational social impairment with various levels in between we often recommend that um the veteran
is honest and upfront with the examiner about how the depression affects their everyday life
uh so that therefore when you're going through the the current symptoms you're making sure that
you're covering everything in full detail with the Examiner yeah and Beyond the severity it's also
important to know how the VA examiner is going to diagnose your psychiatric condition so generally
VA examiners are going to use criteria from the diagnostic and statistical Manual of mental
disorders fifth edition or the DSM-5 to evaluate whether there is a valid diagnosis of depression
so to do that they're going to review the DSM-5 criteria for major depressive disorder
which is the most common type of depressive disorder which involves the following criteria
so first you have to have five or more of the following symptoms that have to be present
during the same two work per two week period and represent a change from your previous functioning
at least one of those symptoms has to be either depressed mood or loss of Interest or pleasure
some other symptoms include a depressed food most of the day nearly every day significant weight
loss psychomotor agitation feelings of loss or of energy nearly every day feelings of worthlessness
or excessiveness nearly every day diminished ability to think or concentrate nearly every day
or recurrent thoughts of death for current suicidal ideation without a specific plan
or a suicide attempt or a specific plan for committing suicide so these symptoms have to cause
clinically significant distress or impairment in Social occupational or other important areas
of functioning and the depression cannot be attributable to the physiological effects of
a substance or to another medical condition so if a veteran meets all of the criteria from the DSM-5
necessary to confirm a diagnosis of depression then this that's when the VA examiner will go to
the symptoms section of the DBQ that Michelle went over to then determine the appropriate
disability rating so first they have to establish that your diagnosis meets the requirements
after the CMP exam is complete VA adjudicators will review the results of the exam alongside
the other evidence in the veterans claims file VA rates depression under 38 CFR 4.130 which
is titled the general rating formula for mental disorders the ratings for mental disorders range
from zero percent to one hundred percent based on the level of Social and occupational impairment
and based on the frequency duration and severity of the symptoms of your psychiatric condition
so let's talk about tips for attending your VA Examination for depression first
and foremost we're always going to recommend you attend your examination
failing to attend the examination can result in a denial and a veteran will need to show good cause
for missing the examination in order to have the examination rescheduled but oftentimes the
denial will come sooner than you can submit your good cause for missing the examination so we do
recommend if it can be avoided please attend your examination again I'm going to stress this again
be honest and upfront a lot of times people will hide their symptoms and maybe not want
to discuss their symptoms in full detail but if you fail to do so you're Rising the ability of
not getting the proper rating and just be careful about what you're saying to you know the examiner
when you're talking and make sure you're talking about how it affects you not even just on a daily
basis but also talking about your worst days because some good days and some days you have
bad days so it's always good to make sure that you're showing the full scope of your disability
it's also a good study with you to the examination if you feel as though they
can offer additional information or you feel comfortable with them there and not comfortable
however you should always discuss ahead of time with the person you're bringing what
you believe will be discussed and make sure that you're on the same page you do want to
make sure that you know a lot of times people don't discuss their symptoms with everyone it's
very known in the mental health community that this does happen so you'd want to be
making sure that you know symptoms that you are experiencing you're not talking about to
The Examiner where you're bringing someone that isn't aware that those symptoms are happening and
can maybe discredit you during the examination so that's why we just say it's always good to
be upfront and honest with a person and have a discussion ahead of time before attending the
examination just so that there are nothing comes up that could present an issue during the exam
it's very important to know that examiners are likely to observe you from the very
beginning this actually means from the moment sometimes you arrive in the parking lot while
for mental health uh examinations this isn't as relevant but it's always good to know that
they'll be they'll usually are observing your attractions with other patients and the staff
so just be aware of that from the moment you attend your exam the moment you arrive
it's always recommended to obtain a copy of your examination veterans can and should obtain a copy
of their VA examination by requesting it from their local regional office it's important to
note that VA will not automatically provide a copy and this can be very important sometimes
there could be misconceptions or confusions about something you've said to The Examiner
it's also a good way to see if there are things in your examination maybe you'll agree with uh so
that you have the ability to respond and this comes to my last tip uh you have the right to
challenge an unfavorable exam so make sure that you know you are reading the examination you can
submit something in writing for the most part and you can learn more about challenging and
unfavorable the examination by checking out one of our videos on the topic that will be linked below
that concludes our information for today thank you for tuning in for more information on CP CMP
exams and disability ratings for depression you can check out our blog posts linked below and
be sure to like the video and subscribe for more veteran related content [Music]