Depression & Anxiety Disability Insurance Claim Help & Tips

Hi I'm Katie Nobles and thank you so much for joining us with me today. We once again have disability attorney Andrew November and he is back with another Andrew's Answers segment and today he's going to be tackling the topic depression and anxiety disability insurance claim health and tips. Thanks Katie. Glad to be back talking about this important topic. I really can't go a day without seeing a claim for mental health whether it's short term long term or even social security disability. These cases are always challenging not because there's some discrimination against mental health claims of course that's possible but as I've said in so many other videos and I use this phrase every day certain claims don't lend themselves to measurable objective findings. For instance if you come to our office with a back pain case and state that you're unable to sit and do your job at your desk well that's kind of I don't want to say it's easy to prove but there's objective evidence that would demonstrate why you might be experiencing difficulty sitting. Mental health it's very different. Now there is good law out there and if we do receive a denial we have the law on our side to litigate and the law states what I just said that certain claims don't lend themselves to objective evidence so you have to look at other factors. Now that doesn't mean there's nothing that you can't do. The most important thing you can do is to see a specialist a mental health specialist. Why is that important? Well the obvious reasons is a specialist is someone who's going to treat you and understands what you're going through and is going to help you improve. When you're looking at the evidence or the litigation side of it what's different about a specialist versus your family physician your internist or your primary care physician? Well foremost is their medical notes. Traditionally primary care physicians and more general physician notes follow what's called the SOAP format and that stands for Subjective is what you tell your doctors. Objective is what they might observe. Assessment might be the diagnosis and plan might be the orders that they give you when you leave the office. What's missing from there? A mental status examination. A mental status examination is something that's included in every single mental health specialist treatment note and that goes through a variety of factors symptoms and signs that your clinician can observe. So when I go to litigate the case I can use that documentation to show a longitudinal pattern of the symptoms and signs to show that you do have restrictions and limitations and therefore are unable to perform the material or essential functions of your job. I love primary care physicians. My primary care physician is fantastic. I know he's there for me whenever I need him but I know there's limitations in what he can do and what his notes are going to say. So I'm not saying you have to stop seeing your primary care physician. Never stop seeing your primary care physician. They're the quarterback. That's what I always say but you need to see a specialist. I'm not telling you that you have to take medication. Do what your doctors say but at the very least see someone who is going to draft notes that are going to capture the complete clinical picture of what you're dealing with and that way when we go to litigate your case we're going to be able to prevail because the notes will support what you're telling me and what you're telling the judge or the insurance company. I hope that helps. If you have any other questions about building your case or seeking treatment I would love to answer. Just give us a call or send us a message. Thank you for watching.