I filed a VA claim for a deviated septum and sleep apnea based on something that happened while deployed in 2003 and after months and months of waiting finally had my VES Veterans Evaluation Service exam today.

I’ve never done this before and felt like I was being grilled by the FBI for an hour straight, then they said “our paperwork indicates possible brain injury too” which I was like “HUH?”. I slammed my face and head into a concrete culvert pipe which was the entrance to a bunker we were running for nonstop back in March 2003 as Sadddam fired SCUD’s at coalition forces, but i never felt like I had any sort of brain injury.

Anyone ever do this? I’m not sure what the outcome will be but I’m not holding my breath.

I filed for tinnitus, provided the copy of my medical record with the claim.

VAs answer was they couldn’t find my records from the CG.

I returned the claim and highlited the page from my medical record and put a post it note on it that said , I provided the record-do your job.

Eight months later I got a letter saying the claim was valid and I got 10%.

Xxxxxx

Fast forward to 2020 and I wanted my hearing tested due to my job in the service (gunners mate).

Went round and round and finally got an appointment to a walk-in hearing clinic.

Doc says yeah you need hearing aid.

They schedule me out for SIX months later to get the device.

Call and bitch

Call the hospital and bitch

Call someone in Waco and bitch

Loose my shit while on the phone with someone and he’s arguing with me hat from Feb to aug isn’t six months. I asked if he was in the infantry? He got pissed off and I said hey buddy welcome to the club now the VA has your BP up too. I was called while on vacation to come in and get the device.

When I get it the doc says yeah it’s been here since March. I explained everything to her and she was aghast.

VA sucks donkey balls. But that’s just my opinion

I filed for hearing loss and tinnitus 2 yr ago. I have been out of the Navy since 1975. I met with a gent at the VA clinic from the American Legion who had an office there to help file the claim. I get 10% disability. This was not on my service records when I mustered out.
He took care of all the forms for the disability and I made an appointment with the Audioligist at the clinic. Had a hearing test and then several months later an independant clinic in Ann Arbor, MI had me come up for the exact same test and it was approved.
VA offered me hearing aids and everything on the spot.
Are the injuries listed on your service record?
I hear TBI is hard to diagnose and they are slow to confirm at the VA, but Pres Trump really straightened out the VA the first couple years of his term and it's better.
Good luck!

Gave all my info to DAV (Disabled American Veterans - I'm a lifetime member), met with the service rep twice. Called and left messages dozens of times, to no response. Finally got a regional rep to call me back. He told me not to worry, they do this all the time. Just prior to one year from my application I got a call from one of the military record centers that they had a weird application with my information on it. Turns out the DAV rep misspelled my name, got my data of birth wrong, got my service information incorrect, refiled for copies of my medical records even though I had already given him a complete copy of them (hundreds of pages). A couple months later I got a letter from the VA saying they couldn't process my claim due to the amount of inaccuracies and incompleteness of the forms.

I gave up. I already have 100% medical coverage from them without a rating. My sanity is severely challenged every time I deal with he VA. The nurse that the VA uses as a doctor said something about seeing physch for PTSD and being evaluated, and I haven't been back. She's a gun grabber.

Don't trust the VA...and be careful about service reps. DAV really screwed me. Those trips were each 160 miles each way, and the idiots couldn't be bothered to even get my correct service.

Work with DAV or VFW. They will help you.

have made claims a couple of times and have found it usually takes a claim and an appeal to get it through the system.

American Legion, VFW and DAV can help.

As far as care, I think it depends on the location. I have been to VA hospitals I won't set foot in again and others that are great. Same with the community outpatient clinics.

quote:

Originally posted by ulsterman:
Work with DAV or VFW. They will help you.

Definitely not a guarantee.

Service reps are VERY hit or miss. Different for every office.

I don't get it AKSuperDually, you used a volunteer who did not work for the VA, and he-not the VA-messed up your forms and you gave up when the VA told you they were inaccurate and incomplete?

I understand some folks have had bad experiences with the VA-but they have saved my life three-THREE-times (so far).

And I am getting a procedure (a bone marrow biopsy) Wednesday that may require them to try to do it again-don't know how that will turn out but I trust them and, even though I have good health insurance, I ain't going anywhere else if the results of the biopsy turn out to be bad for me.

So far, over 20 years- they've treated me great. When I first got married to my wife, she was a Nurse Practitioner at the VA Hospital and I refused to go there. I hated even dropping her off or picking her up there if she was having her car serviced. I'd heard the stories about the VA. Wanted nothing to do with them or with the patients that used the facilities. I avoided anything that smelled remotely like "military."

But my wife finally (after about 15 years of marriage) talked me into just one visit. I was really impressed and continued to go there for doc work. No problem filling out the forms-I still had all the "stuff" from when I was in the service. The Va is convenient, only four miles from my house and they very, very rarely keep me waiting past my appointment time.

I still avoid the Legion, VFW and other similar so-called service organizations like the plague, but the VA here, perhaps because it's a huge hospital, has treated me wonderfully.

Yeah, I know, YMMV.

Bob

quote:

Originally posted by AKSuperDually:

quote:

Originally posted by ulsterman:
Work with DAV or VFW. They will help you.

Definitely not a guarantee.

Service reps are VERY hit or miss. Different for every office.

As with life, there are not guarantees. What is a better option?

My experience with the VA and service-connected disability, over the last 48 years, is that it depends greatly on whether we are getting into a war, getting out of a war, or not at war.

When they no longer want to serve you, you'll know it.

Keep plugging away and good luck.

quote:

Originally posted by straightshooter1:
I don't get it AKSuperDually, you used a volunteer who did not work for the VA, and he-not the VA-messed up your forms and you gave up when the VA told you they were inaccurate and incomplete?

I understand some folks have had bad experiences with the VA-but they have saved my life three-THREE-times (so far).

And I am getting a procedure (a bone marrow biopsy) Wednesday that may require them to try to do it again-don't know how that will turn out but I trust them and, even though I have good health insurance, I ain't going anywhere else if the results of the biopsy turn out to be bad for me.

So far, over 20 years- they've treated me great. When I first got married to my wife, she was a Nurse Practitioner at the VA Hospital and I refused to go there. I hated even dropping her off or picking her up there if she was having her car serviced. I'd heard the stories about the VA. Wanted nothing to do with them or with the patients that used the facilities. I avoided anything that smelled remotely like "military."

But my wife finally (after about 15 years of marriage) talked me into just one visit. I was really impressed and continued to go there for doc work. No problem filling out the forms-I still had all the "stuff" from when I was in the service. The Va is convenient, only four miles from my house and they very, very rarely keep me waiting past my appointment time.

I still avoid the Legion, VFW and other similar so-called service organizations like the plague, but the VA here, perhaps because it's a huge hospital, has treated me wonderfully.

Yeah, I know, YMMV.

Bob

In my situation for filing, the VA is not to blame at all. DAV is. Also...they aren't volunteers, they're paid by the VA to assist veterans.

My issues with the VA are separate, mostly due to their complete lack of competency and inability to perform their jobs.

quote:

Originally posted by ulsterman:

quote:

Originally posted by AKSuperDually:

quote:

Originally posted by ulsterman:
Work with DAV or VFW. They will help you.

Definitely not a guarantee.

Service reps are VERY hit or miss. Different for every office.

As with life, there are not guarantees. What is a better option?

Find out who the good reps are in your area, use someone with a proven track record. Their screw ups can set your claims back considerably.

quote:

Originally posted by ulsterman:
Work with DAV or VFW. They will help you.

THIS !!!!!!!!!!

I went through the process with appeals 3 separate times. Each was more in depth than the last. The questions ranged from run of the mill to WHY THE FUCK WOULD YOU ASK ME SOMETHING LIKE THAT!

TBI is no joke and if you hit your face hard enough to break your nose, it was hard enough to jostle your noodle. I was knocked out cold for a while and to this day, I have migraines and get floaters in my vision.

Combat injuries are hard to document (and they do it on purpose). If your command was nice enough to let you see a "doc", the TMC won't do much more than make a shorthand note with runes/symbols describing what the issue was. If you're lucky, someone competent wrote a clear note of what/when/why something happened. None of it really matters without a serious incident report/casualty report. If you didn't make a complete copy of every scrap of paper with notes in the margins included before you got out, you're gonna have an even harder time. I think "officially" lots of stuff that should be in a record gets lost in fires or some other mysterious disappearance.

Using myself as an example:
I gave the VA the info needed in the 1st claim with supporting documents. VA said- Nope, that's not in your file...didn't happen!
1st appeal-restated what I said in my original claim, dug a little deeper for supporting documentation and sent it in. VA said- Nope, that's not in your file...didn't happen! If you claim it did, give witness statements. Really? Guess I was chums with every person on patrol that day and I have all of there contact details 10+ years later...Fucking imbeciles.
Anyway, 2nd appeal-restated original claim, dug even deeper for supporting docs and said fuck it...I'm all in. The VA got every single piece of paper I had accumulated during my military career. They got PT scorecards, weapons qualifications, my 201 File, my medical record and every SIR/CR that I could get my hands on, along with some letters from a few guys that I actually did keep in contact with. They finally called me in to speak with a rep to go over all of my documents. In comparing what I had vs what the army "gave them" (at least according to the rep), we found that the better part a year and a half was missing...my medical records mysteriously only went to February 2003 but I didn't ETS until June 2004. Not saying it's a conspiracy but it's a fucking conspiracy if you know what I mean. Someone knowingly "deleted" a very important set of documents that held my claim up for 3.5 years. After the documents were provided I was scheduled for a visit with a VA psychiatrist, a VA neurologist, and a 3rd party evaluator. Fast forward 6 months and I had a rating.

Honestly, I think there should be an Oak Leaf Cluster or V device for enduring the "process". I never thought my government would try to shaft me that hard but they did. I can't imagine how any veteran from Desert Storm or before has a chance at getting a rating. Too many chances for things to go missing.

Good luck to you PASig.