so
good afternoon and welcome to cck live my name is jenna zellmer joining me today are amy odom
and erin collins the three of us represent veterans both at the va and at the court of
appeals for veterans claims and today we are going to be discussing how to win va
disability claims for depression so before we get into the specifics about how to win
i just want to give a little overview about what exactly is depression so depression is a
serious mental health condition that affects the way a person thinks feels and acts and
it's actually one of the most common mental health issues that former service members face
it can have long-term effects on their daily lives and their well-being um symptoms can
vary so some of the more common ones include persistent feelings of sadness worthlessness
and hopelessness lack of motivation or interest in activities that usually derive pleasure
difficulty sleeping and concentrating change in appetite resulting in weight loss or weight gain
irritability and fatigue so if you feel like you are having some of these symptoms it's definitely
important to stick around and listen to what we have to say today so let's kick it off with amy
let's talk a little bit about how to get direct service connection for depression thanks jenna
so to establish service connection for depression on a direct basis veterans must show three things
first that they have a current diagnosis of depression this is going to have to be a doctor's
diagnosis of depression using the diagnostic and statistical manual of mental health disorders so
the easiest and most reliable way to prove this is through medical records from either
your private mental health professional or if you're receiving mental health through the va
or sometimes va will send you for an exam for benefits purposes and if the va examiner diagnoses
depression then that will be enough to show this first thing the second thing you're going to
need to show is that there was an in-service service event that means either you started
having depression symptoms in service or something happened in service that later caused depression
even if it wasn't diagnosed or first manifested in service as always the best form of evidence
to prove this are service treatment records as they'll have documented any injury or illness
including symptoms for which you might have sought treatment they also can help show that you
had um some sort of event that later uh gave rise to the depression any treatment records that you
have in a in the period immediately following service is going to be helpful in showing that
even if it wasn't treated or diagnosed in service the depression began in service
and any lay statements from yourself or the friends your friends and family
attesting to symptoms or changes that happened in service will also be helpful um in showing
the onset and progression of the depression how it relates to service and the impact and
activities the daily living one thing to keep in mind here is that um if there's something
hap if something happened in service that later caused the depression that event does not have
to be military related it doesn't have to be related to your actual military duties
it can be any event that happens in the veteran's lifetime as long as the veteran
was on active duty at the time it occurred and the last thing you're going to need is a medical nexus
between the depression and the in-service event or the symptoms that that you had during service
this most in most cases is going to have to be in the form of an opinion from a medical professional
and as long as you have a qualified health care professional saying that they believe
that your depression was at least as likely as not caused by military service or began in service
that should be sufficient to prove this third element so again the three requirements are
a current diagnosis of depression something that happened in service or
symptoms of depression in service any a medical opinion about a relationship between those two
thanks amy and yeah we have a lot of different blog posts and i think we have
other videos that kind of go into a little bit more detail about each of those three elements
but those are three elements that if you're approving service connection for any type of
disability besides ptsd those are the three elements that you're really going to need to show
um for direct service connection so definitely check out our website for more information about
those three elements but that's not the only way that you can demonstrate service connection for
depression so aaron why don't you explain a little bit about secondary service connection
um so a veteran can also receive service connected compensation for depression on a secondary basis
if their depression is a result of another service-connected condition so an example is
if a veteran has an orthopedic condition and they become depressed because of the constant
pain that they're experiencing or the limitations due to that physical condition that their service
connected for then that could prevent them from doing things that they used to do causing the
depression they could also establish a service secondary service connection for depression
by demonstrating a current diagnosis of depression as well as medical evidence
showing the relationship or the nexus between the service connected disability and the depression
the service connection works both ways um as far as it goes for pre-existing injury
that might cause the depression but also if the service-connected depression causes
a new condition you could also receive service connection um for aggravation
um in the way that if you are service connected sorry if your a veteran could suffer from
depression prior to entering service but then an in-service event causes the depression to worsen
then they could be service-connected for the depression and the aggravation
establishing service connection based on the theory of aggravation often requires
a medical opinion from a qualified health professional stating that it's at least as
likely as not that the veterans depression is worsened as a result of their service
all right thanks erin and so a recurring theme that i think people are noticing is that a
medical opinion is really necessary and so when processing claims or service connection va will
almost always schedule veterans for what they call a compensation and pension exam through a
va medical center or through a private facility we're actually seeing more and more of these
contract exams through private facilities so don't be surprised if you're contacted
by someone that is not va but is va affiliated um to schedule an exam and during that exam the
veteran is going to discuss their symptoms um and the examiner is going to both provide an opinion
about whether or not they think that condition is related to service or related to a service
connected condition and they're also going to establish the severity of the condition so that
if service connection is awarded then va can grant um an assigned rating so the examiner is going to
compile the findings and submit them to va and then va is going to make the ultimate decision
um i think we have a lot of information about what happens at cnp examinations um i think the biggest
takeaway is that you must attend your examination so if you get um a schedule and it doesn't work
for you um definitely call and reach out and try to reschedule va is going to go through with their
rating decision whether or not you show up or not and so if you don't show up to your exam va
is likely going to deny you or they'll underrate you and so you really want to be present at that
examination to further advocate for yourself and give va as much information as it needs in order
to award you the benefits that you deserve and when you attend an exam um you are entitled to
request a copy of that exam after the examiner is complete you can request that from your local
regional office va will not automatically provide you a copy but it's important to request a copy
so that you can read it over respond if you think that the examiner said something wrong
or didn't adequately portray the severity of your condition or maybe they you know misheard you when
you said something about what happened to you in service so you can challenge that um so it's
important to talk to your representative to kind of find out more about your options in that regard
sometimes you can do it um before the va makes the reading decision sometimes you can do it after it
kind of just depends on where you are procedurally so let's assume um you've gone to the examination
you have told the examiner everything that you want to do and the examiner gave you a favorable
nexus opinion and provided um an opinion about how severe your symptoms are what happens next
amy after va award service connection so the next thing va's gonna do is figure out what rating
the veteran gets and va uses a general rating formula for mental disorders that applies to
pretty much all uh mental health diagnoses including depression pts anxiety that's all
in this one um one braiding formula that they have for mental disorders you can find that um general
formula by googling 38 cfr 4.130 that should pull up the the rating criteria that you can take a
look at and if you do you'll see that the ratings for all mental health disabilities are based on
the level of social and occupational impairment that the mental health disability causes and the
severity of symptoms that va uses to characterize that impairment the ratings range from zero
percent for a diagnosed mental health disability that doesn't cause any impairment to 100 percent
which is the rating that a veteran would get if he or she suffers from total occupational and social
impairment due to symptoms such as persistent delusions um persistent danger to self and others
um in between are 10 30 and 50 and 70 ratings that are based on uh varying levels of social
and uh occupational impairment and symptoms of increasing severity um importantly though
although the rating criteria lists specific symptoms for each rating the veteran doesn't even
even have to have the symptoms that are listed in that criteria those are just examples of symptoms
that va feels would be productive of the type and severity of the occupational and social
impairment commensurate with a specific rating so for example in a 70 rating
the um symptoms of like suicidal ideation inability to establish and maintain effective
relationships are just some examples that are listed there but that doesn't mean that you have
to have suicidal ideation and an inability to have effective relationships in order to get the 70. if
you have other symptoms that are even unlisted but are of a similar severity frequency and duration
you should and and they cause the level of occupational and social impairment that's
listed in the criteria for a 70 rating you should be entitled to that 70 rating too
i think you know usually we see a lot of veterans who are around the 30 and the 50 ratings um you
see a few more in the 70 range but i think it's very rare to be rated at a 100 percent rating
under the scheduler criteria for mental health conditions you really have to show total
occupational and social impairment so you can't have a job you can't have any friends or family
um and so it's a pretty high burden but if you um are unable to show that you can if you're able to
show that you're unable to work through your depression you might be able to get 100 rating
under a different theory so aaron why don't you tell us a little bit about tdiu so if a veteran
is unable to secure and maintain substantially gainful employment as a result of their service
connected depression then they could be entitled to a total disability rating based on tdi
based on total unemployability or tdiu is what we refer to it as the veteran might qualify
for tdiu on a schedule or basis or extra scheduler depending on their circumstances
for more information on tdiu you can check out our blogs we have multiple videos on tdiu
yeah it's definitely important to think about that if you're not working
and the scheduler versus extra scheduler basis just refers to
um how many service disabilities you currently have and what your overall rating is
um i would say it's definitely easier to get tdiu on a scheduler basis but it's definitely not
impossible to get it in an extra schedular basis but like aaron said definitely check
out our blog we have so much information on tdiu um and it's definitely really complicated and um
sometimes you know you have to convince va to award it and so i would encourage you to reach out
to your veteran service officer or your attorney whoever is helping you because this is definitely
um a confusing area of the law that requires some level of expertise so that's all we have for
you today thank you so much for joining us as we mentioned throughout a lot more info can be found
on our blog and our other youtube videos so don't forget to subscribe to our channel to stay updated
you