Legal Help for Veterans blog.
Claims Processing, Medical Issues / Disability, News and Press, Veterans Law
by Jim Fausone VA announced that on November 1st it has finally started making payments under the new AO rules. Providing initial payments – or increases to existing payments – to the 200,000 Veterans who now qualify for disability compensation is expected to take several months. The three new presumptive diseases which have been in the press all year are: […]
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Claims Processing, Medical Issues / Disability, News and Press, Veterans Law
by Kristina Derro The VA has recently agreed to review the cases of nearly 17,000 “Brown Water” Vietnam Era veterans who have claimed disabilities related to Agent Orange exposure. VA previously denied a number of these claims without properly determining whether they served in Vietnam’s inland waterways (“Brown Water”) or in other locations where they […]
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Claims Processing, Medical Issues / Disability, Veterans Law
By Jim Fausone If you have a disability rating from VA, the first step is done. But you will want to get rated at 100% permanently disabled if appropriate. It is just one way that a disabled vet can take care of his family now and in the future. Without that designation, the vet’s family […]
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Medical Issues / Disability, News and Press
By Jim Fausone It has been almost twenty years since the Gulf War, last year the VA once again reviewed how it was handling GW veteran claims. In August, VA announced three new Gulf War illness studies: • A five-year study on the impact of resistance-exercise training to treat chronic musculoskeletal pain. • A four-year study on […]
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Claims Processing, Medical Issues / Disability, News and Press, Veterans Law
by Jim Fausone In late July 2010 the US House passed a funding bill for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Within the bill was $13.4 billion for the payment of benefits to Vietnam veterans and survivors for exposure to Agent Orange related to the three diseases recently added to the “presumptive-connection” list: Parkinson’s disease, ischemic […]
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Medical Issues / Disability, News and Press
A recent study found that Vietnam vets with penetrating head injuries could first exhibit seizures decades after the injury. The Journal Neurology published a report that found that among a group of 199 Vietnam veterans, about 13% developed post-traumatic epilepsy more than 14 years after they had suffered a penetrating head wound, such as a gunshot […]
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Medical Issues / Disability, Mental Health, PTSD
It has been reported in the New York Times, VAWatchDog.com and NBC, that VA intends to issue new rules loosening the requirements for PTSD. VA is apparently evaluating essentially eliminating the requirement that veterans document specific events like bomb blasts, firefights or mortar attacks that might have caused PTSD. We know this as proving “a service stressor”. […]
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Medical Issues / Disability, News and Press
Congress has now passed legislation for wounded Iraq and Afghanistan veterans that would establish an unprecedented permanent program to support the caregivers of wounded warriors, improve health care for veterans in rural areas, help VA adapt to the needs of women veterans, and expand supportive services for homeless veterans. The President must sign the legislation. […]
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Medical Issues / Disability
Do you read articles about veteran and military matters and wonder why is this news? You know, like the VA system is broken. No kidding. Or the cost of military health care (and veteran health care) is on the rise. Is that really news? We deal with veterans and the VA everyday, so I guess […]
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Medical Issues / Disability, News and Press
By Jim Fausone We have dozens of Marine veterans ask each year about their exposure to toxic drinking water at Camp Lejeune. While the existence of the contaminated water is now well documented, the medical nexus to specific disabilities has not been accepted. Recently, VA recognized that ingestion of contaminated water could cause ratable disabilities. […]
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