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[Music] hello everyone thank you so much for joining us today for our cck live discussion my name is maura black i'm joined today by mike lastrido and nick briggs all from chisholm chisholm and kilpatrick today we're discussing common mistakes that veterans make on their claims so we have a number of items that we wanted to talk about many of these items deal with topics that are outlined and described on our website cck.law.com so definitely please feel free to take advantage of any resources on the website that might be relevant to today's discussion so we want to first start by explaining just for a little bit of context what veterans should be thinking about generally when filing a claim for benefits particularly a claim for service connection and thinking about the elements of the claim is is sort of a theme that we're going to be talking about today because when we talk about potential pitfalls or mistakes that veterans might might make or experience during the claims process one of the big overarching things is keeping in mind what the elements of the claim are that you're trying to prove so for a service connection claim you generally have to establish three things you want to establish number one that you have a current disability of course va will need evidence that you have a disability in order to be able to grant benefits for that disability so that's the first thing you can show that by medical evidence and sometimes in some cases through lay evidence of your symptoms and how they affect you so making sure to keep detailed information giving that to va regarding your symptoms any diagnoses that you have any treatment that you receive all of that's helpful to prove the current disability element the second thing is that there has to be some in-service event in service diagnosis in-service onsen onset excuse me of the disability so this the second element um needs to be supported by some evidence some allegation that there's an in-service event that caused the current disability or that is related to it and that leads us to the third element of service connection which is a nexus between your current disability and the in-service event so keeping those things in mind it is important when trying to be successful on filing a claim that you submit evidence or lay testimony or medical records or really anything that you have that pertains to those three elements so there are a number of procedural issues that can come into play mistakes that we see commonly um that veterans might make when filing their claims but overall those are the things that you want to be keeping in mind if you're going to pursue a claim for service connection we're also going to be talking about increased rating claims here and there throughout this broadcast increased rating claims pertain to a request for an increased evaluation for something that a veteran is already service connected so an increased rating claim just requires you to demonstrate that there's been some increase in the severity of the condition but for increased rating claims it's also important to remember that va has certain diagnostic codes and certain ways that they evaluate the a broad range of medical disabilities and so keeping in mind the parameters of va's diagnostic codes and their rating schedule those are important so that you can establish if you're filing an increased rating claim that your condition has actually worsened so that's kind of an overview of the things that are going to be discussed later in today's discussion and some things that we always keep in mind when filing claims on behalf of veterans and that veterans should also be keeping in mind those are the things that va cares about those three elements for service connection and then evidence of worsening if it's an increased rating claim consistent with the type of disability that the veteran has so all of that being said we want to move on to mistake number one which is waiting to file a claim mike can you talk to us about this mistake if you've seen it before in our practice and what veterans could do to avoid making this um pretty common mistake i think in the va benefits world sure thanks maura um yeah absolutely the first mistake that we see and i think we see it somewhat frequently veterans often wait to file their initial claim or a claim for an increased rating they often wait to file their claim because they think that they need to go out and obtain all the evidence to prove their case before they file their claim um and in most instances that's not necessary um their veterans are allowed to file a claim and then supplement the claim later on with additional evidence if they have a legal argument to make to do it later on as well and it also in a lot of instances filing a claim triggers va's duty to go out and obtain evidence on the veterans behalf and so really it's not necessary and as i'll discuss in a second here uh can really be detrimental for veterans to wait to file their claim until they have all the evidence and really the the biggest reason why that's the case is because waiting to file a claim can delay a veteran's effective date for that claim generally speaking effective dates are determined by the date that va receives a veteran's claim and so waiting to file a claim can really impact the date that va determines is the effective date of the claim and therefore can limit any amount of retroactive benefits that are awarded if that claim is ultimately granted and so just bottom line what that means is that veterans can miss out on va disability compensation that they may be entitled to but may fail to have awarded based on the fact that they delayed filing their claim um so you know like i said even if va initially denies your claim um the effective date of the claim will be established and veterans can then you know later on obtain and submit additional evidence uh they can ask that va go out and obtain additional evidence to help prove the claim um but again in most instances that evidence is not necessarily required to be submitted at the time a veteran files their claim and so whether it's a claim for an increased rating whether it's a claim for an initial claim for service connection um you know it's really important i think to if you think you have a condition that's related to your service go ahead and file the claim and that will a bare minimum preserve the effective date of the claim for any future appeal that you might need to make um there are a couple of different things that can happen and can really benefit veterans even if they file their claim knowing they don't have all the evidence they need you know if if the veteran say is granted service connection but the veteran wasn't able to submit the evidence they think they need to show severity of the condition and say they're assigned to zero percent or a non-compensable rating for their condition that zero percent or non-compensable rating can still qualify the veteran for several va benefits um including potentially health care benefits and just establishing service connection even if the rating isn't what you might have hoped it to be really makes the job i think a little bit easier down the road and shifts gears to proving the severity of the condition rather than trying to you know provide the evidence to establish that initial link and so um filing the claim you know when you think the entitlement to the condition has arisen i think is important get the process going as you know a lot of us all know the va process can be quite lengthy so the sooner we submit our claim the better it preserves the effective date and will have the opportunity in most instances down the road to develop and submit additional evidence that's all very helpful and i think there are two things that you mentioned in particular that i have seen quite a bit um one thing is that veterans might wait to file their claim as mike said because they want to make sure that they prove all of the elements of the claim up front and with their initial claim submission so while it's important to include any helpful information that you might have with your claim and anything that speaks to those three elements of service connection that we spoke about before it's also important to remember that va has a duty to assist claimants in developing their claims and in obtaining evidence that might substantiate the claims that veterans file so since va has a duty to assist you with your claim it it kind of stands to reason that you don't need to file a claim with absolutely everything in support because va will have a duty to go out and get certain records potentially request medical opinions to speak to that third element of service connection which is the medical nexus between your current disability and your in-service experiences so not having all your your ducks in a row so to speak shouldn't be a deterrent from at least getting that claim filed which speaks to a second point mike that you made which is that if you don't file right away you do probably will not get the effective date um until you file the claim and that's usually the basis of the effective date that va will award we see a lot of times veterans assume that if something was diagnosed in service and they later file a claim for that condition that that proof of an in-service diagnosis should mean that their effective date is when they left service but that's not exactly the way that effective dates work um and i think we did a recent video on this generally speaking effective dates don't kick in until the date of a claim or the date that entitlement arose whichever is later and it's usually that filing the claim part that's later so it's really important if you'd like to be seeking benefits to file something you can always supplement the record between the time that the claim is filed and at least the time that you get your first decision depending on what appeal lane you choose thereafter but definitely important to remember that if you are really intending to pursue a claim it's best to file it right away the second mistake we wanted to talk about um sort of deals with forms so nick can you talk about mistakes that are very common with filing forms incorrectly or filing the incorrect forms when veterans are trying to initiate the claims process um so we've done entire cck live presentations on this before but va has a variety of forms many of them have multiple sections and oftentimes you're gonna need to fill out most if not all of those sections and with the introduction of the appeals modernization act there are even more forms for veterans to need to keep track of as they work their way through the claims process um so it's incredibly important for them to make sure that they're filling out the correct forms and that they're filling them out completely often times we see situations where a veteran might have filed the wrong form in response to a decision and as a result they couldn't miss their deadline to appeal that decision further which could run the risk of losing their effective date because a decision wasn't properly appealed or continued so for that reason it's especially important to again make sure that you're filling up the right form that you're filling it out completely and to be cognizant of the fact that va might reach out to you for clarification they could send you a letter indicating that you need to fill out a new form or that the form that you filled out is filled out incorrectly or incompletely and in those situations you want to respond as quickly as possible because they're often prescribed deadlines by which you need to respond to va's requests for clarification and if you don't we circle back to the chance that you might be losing your effective date so with regard to filing initial claims specifically there are a number of different ways that a veteran can do that they can still do it online using va's ebenefits program platform um they can also file a va form 21-526-easy or if they need to they can fill it out either with a legal representative like a veteran service organization or an accredited attorney or they could go directly to the regional office and work with the va employee to fill out the form and get it submitted but one way or another in order to get your claims started you need to be doing it through one of these means making sure that the correct form is filled out and submitted and then if they do ask you to clarify the form in any way that you're doing it as quickly as possible and related to the form issue is something another mistake that we wanted to talk about which sort of deals with the substance of the form and so the third mistake that we see often is forms that don't specifically list any secondary conditions to the ones that are being claimed so just as background for those who are not familiar there is a concept called secondary service connection that is a little bit different than the standard path to getting a disability service connected you still have to show that you have a current disability you still have to show that there was some in-service event um that is related to your service-connected disability and then you have to show a nexus but when you're filing a claim for a condition and that condition leads to other conditions that is something you want to keep in mind when you're filling out your claim form so i think an example would probably break this down a little bit better because it's a little bit confusing but if you are filing a claim for benefits for a back disability you're filing just a direct service connection claim you're alleging that your back disability was caused by some in-service orthopedic problem or an in-service fall or something like that but your back disability also causes other disabilities like perhaps radiculopathy in the lower extremities or other issues that might arise due to your back disability it's important to keep those in mind when you're filing your claim for your back disability because those conditions could potentially be granted service connection as secondary to the primary condition which is your back condition so if the back condition claim is granted then at that point you could be eligible for benefits for those secondary conditions pursuant to the secondary service connection theory which is just that you have disabilities related to something that is already deemed service related i i kind of think this mistake cuts both ways we have it on here as a mistake that veterans make and we definitely see some veterans not completing the claim forms with all of the detail about their secondary conditions or their residual conditions to their primary injury and that lack of detail can be a problem down the road va might just grant service connection for that one back disability and they might overlook all of the evidence that connects other conditions to the back disability but i also think that this is a mistake that va makes commonly um we see people file claims a lot and when va conducts their duty to assist development and they gather development in support of the veterans claims sometimes that development reveals that there are conditions related to the primary claimed condition so the back condition leading to radiculopathy problem diabetes leading to peripheral neuropathy is another one that we see often a cervical spine condition leading to upper extremity problems those things va should be granting service connection for if the evidence establishes that they're clearly related to a service-connected condition the problem is when we see those grants come through for the underlying condition they've sometimes overlooked that evidence about what is arising secondary to the primary claimed condition and so even though va has a duty to maximize the claimant's benefits and to make sure that they are assigning compensable ratings and granting compensation for anything related to the claimed condition the reality is that that doesn't happen um with the accuracy or thoroughness that we'd like to see from va or really that the law requires and so i think the reason why we have this on here is a mistake that veterans make is because it kind of falls on the veterans to make sure that they explain to va what their expectation is so if you have a claimed condition again the back disability is pretty easy but you know that that's leading to other issues it's really important to list those on your original claim form one reason why doing that is helpful is because it it will ensure that va might pay attention to those things more so than if you did not list them on your form and it also would be a good way to avoid effective date issues in the future so if you don't list those secondary conditions but you later allege that those should have been granted with your primary condition va has a habit of reaching out to claimants and saying well if you want to file a claim then you should start over with the brand new claims process for those secondary conditions and doing that might cut off some time on the appeal clock and might result in an effective date being assigned that's not as favorable as the effective date that was assigned for the primary condition so again i kind of think that this is just as much a va mistake as it is a mistake that veterans make but to help the process along to kind of play ball i think it's important to make sure that your claim form articulates all of the disabilities that you think could be related to service or to a service-connected condition yeah i think that's a really important point um i mean oftentimes these secondary conditions can um be the difference in you know if they're granted the veteran jumping an entire compensation level and so there's oftentimes a lot of conditions as you said that are related to what the veteran is in their mind primarily filing for va those they're supposed to review those things of course doesn't always do so so i think it's really incumbent upon the veteran to just keep that in mind when they're filing when they're presenting evidence you know don't let va's denials um dissuade you from pursuing those secondary conditions due to your primary conditions because you know in a lot of instances the law does support that these conditions should be linked to the primary condition that's being claimed um and you know quite honestly there's just there's there are a lot of opportunities and a lot of avenues to link these conditions and to get additional benefits so um you know i think that's a great point it's something that i see in my practice veterans sometimes they might have tunnel vision they might you know solely be focusing on their ptsd claim when um their ptsd claim could also result in you know two other conditions uh perhaps being service connected as well that they may not have thought about so it's it's something to keep in mind i think it's it's good advice and something that we do see frequently here i actually want to come back to you mike to talk about the fourth mistake that we have here um and that deals with the failure to obtain a medical nexus opinion so again we talked earlier about the three elements for service connection when you're filing a claim for benefits you have to show a current disability an in-service event or onset and then the third element excuse me is really important and that deals with a nexus between elements one and two the current disability and the in-service event so mike can you talk to us about mistakes that might arise when veterans are not obtaining their own excuse me nexus opinions yeah and this is this is a big one i mean failing to obtain a medical opinion um is a mistake that you know a lot of veterans come to us um having tried to pursue their claim on their own for a while um and being uh rejected time and again and one of the things at least that i notice in my practice is that oftentimes the difference between a claim that will be granted and a claim that will be denied is the uh ability to obtain medical evidence and submit that of uh medical evidence in support of the claim so va will often deny veterans claims based on you know a lack of medical evidence linking their conditions to their time in service so that encompasses that third element of service connection that nexus element but also i think in terms of veterans showing that they have a disability or they have a diagnosis of a condition oftentimes not always but often times veterans will need some form of medical evidence to establish that particularly particular element of of service connection as well um and so what you know va will do is they will they will look at their treatment records that they have in the file they will if they provide a compensation and pension examination a va exam as they're known va relies very heavily on the findings and conclusions that come out of those cmp exams and i think a mistake is veterans oftentimes rely on the findings of those cmp exams as well um and as i think we all know um oftentimes the findings and conclusions that are articulated in those compensation pension va exams do not adequately represent the true nature or the extent of the veterans disabilities um you know they're often you know you know diagnoses that go unreported um perhaps there are nexus opinions that are formed after a veteran has only been seen by the medical provider for 10 minutes you know it's difficult i think sometimes to come up with a medical diagnosis and opinion um based on that and so uh because va relies so heavily on these va exams it's really important that in order to fully develop their claim or their appeal veterans go out and obtain their own medical opinion or evidence and submit that in support of their claim or appeal and so in order to do that veterans can simply ask their treating physician [Music] or medical provider to provide a letter a nexus letter perhaps or our letter saying yes this veteran has this diagnosis um if they are working if a veteran's working with an accredited representative it's often possible to obtain an expert medical opinion um and so that individual can take a look at the file and render an opinion as to you know whether the veteran has a diagnosis whether the veteran's condition can be related to something in service if a veteran is going to obtain their own medical evidence i think there are a couple things that they want to be thinking about in terms of strengthening any nexus or any physician letter that they might submit the first thing is that they do want the letter to be written by a licensed professional ideally someone that has the appropriate medical or clinical experience in the field that they're opining on number two i think you know really it's important that this person review if if possible but also state in the letter that they are basing their opinion on the veterans time and service and service records medical and personnel records and just generally um any medical history that they're aware of um of the veteran oftentimes we'll see veterans who you know maybe they've been treating with a private physician a private you know orthopedic surgeon for uh ten years or so that orthopedic surgeon will then have a pretty strong basis i think to say in a letter that you know this has been my patient for x amount of years um i you know i'm familiar with their file with their medical records and i'm competent therefore essentially to to make an opinion as to whether the veteran has a certain diagnosis whether the veteran's condition can be related to something that happened in service and that is just kind of building the foundation the competency of this physician or medical provider to offer this opinion again va relies very heavily on their own experts their own cmp examiners i should say their own medical evidence and so if a veteran or if you know an accredited rep is submitting an outside opinion they want to do whatever they can to build that credibility of their own uh provider number three i think it's very important if at all possible for a nexus letter or you know a physician's letter being submitted to be phrased in a way that recognizes the appropriate legal standard for proving the elements of service connection you know the va system is based on a system that in theory is supposed to be beneficial and give the benefit of doubt to the veteran and so what that means is that the legal standard to prove the case is necessarily less than what it might be in a normal you know say medical malpractice case or litigation you know some type of negligence case per se and so the legal standard is that you know the veteran um needs to show only by um the at least as likely as not standard essentially that means that if the evidence is 50 50 and it's at least as likely to have occurred as not to have occurred then the veteran should be granted service connection or that particular element of service connection should be established and so if in providing a nexus letter or a medical opinion the provider can phrase their opinion using that language uh i think it goes a long way to helping establish kind of the credibility of their opinion um and it's couched in language that va is familiar with and that always is beneficial um and then finally and this i think is is really really critical you know a one sentence letter uh that just is bare bones and conclusory and states you know yes the veteran's condition is related to his or her time in service that might be helpful um but it also really lacks any supporting rationale any reasoning um and va may find that um it's it's just not that probative relative to maybe the other evidence in the file so anything that a provider can do anything that you know your medical expert can do or your treating physician can do to support their opinion provide rationale provide you know some citations to medical treatment or records anything they can do to essentially show their work in essence to show how they came to that determination is going to go a long way to proving to va that this opinion can be trusted it's probative evidence and we we need to consider it in making our decision if a veteran um is going to try to obtain this sort of medical evidence or or letter on their own one thing that they can think about doing is filling out or having the medical provider fill out what's known as a dbq form recently i think va removed these they used to have these dbq forms freely available to veterans on their website i think there was a time recently over the past year or so when those forms had been removed from va's website um but we've obtained some new information that we believe those dbq forms are going to be provided once again and available if they're not already um available sometime in the near future for veterans to to download to take have their va or not i'm sorry not their va their their private physician or whoever the medical provider is fill it out and then they can submit it on that form these are just kind of the prescribed forms that va will recognize they will know it offers a number of kind of fill in the blank fields for the provider to go through and offer their opinion um you know i know that whether it's on our website whether it's on our blog we have a lot more information about nexus letters about dbqs in particular and so please feel free to visit our blog feel free to visit our website to get some additional information in this area i think one of the things you mentioned that's really important is making sure that the nexus letters that veterans obtain do use the applicable va standard of proof and as a procedural matter that they look like the type of exams that va is used to accepting and so that kind of feeds into your point mike about the importance of using the dbq forms or the disability benefits questionnaire forms as mike said va did remove them from their website they have been instructed to put them back up on the website and we're not exactly sure when that's going to happen but either way we have a number of gbq forms available at our website at cck dashlaw.com if people are looking for a reference for those so nexus letters are highly highly relevant and essential to service connection claims nick the next mistake we want to talk with you about is the issue when claimants submit evidence that's not relevant to their claims and how that can be a mistake or a pitfall in the claim process sure so oftentimes particularly with increased rating claims a veteran's job is to submit any evidence they can to show that their service connected conditions have worsened or in the case of service connection to show that they have a diagnosis of a condition but oftentimes rather than submitting just the evidence that's relevant to their claim um they submit everything that they have um be it their the entirety of their service records or um 3 000 pages of medical records and oftentimes those medical records are going to contain irrelevant information including treatment for non-service-connected disabilities surgeries for non-service-connected disabilities so on and so forth so it's not necessarily helpful to submit huge packets of 3000 medical 3000 pages of medical records to the va because they might have a hard time digging through it and finding the evidence that is relevant to your claim be it mental health notes or orthopedic evaluation notes or so on and so forth so whenever you're getting ready to submit this evidence to va it's a good idea to sort of look through everything that you have make sure that it's relevant to your claims conditions in particular otherwise it could cause va to be delayed in reviewing your case because it takes so long to go through the unnecessary information or it could result in a denial because they overlook the favorable evidence you submitted entirely because it got missed amongst the sea of other things that weren't relevant to the claims condition so when we're talking relevant evidence we're talking about personal statements from you and your family members both medical records from your current treatment or any service records that you have um and again just review the evidence that you're submitting make sure that it's relevant and then submit it to va all at once and if you can write a letter to accompany the evidence that you're submitting pointing them in the direction of the things that you think are important or relevant it's going to make it easier for a va to adjudicate your claim all at once and you run a much lower risk of them denying something simply because they didn't see this treatment record that treatment record um that's not to say that you shouldn't submit anything that couldn't be relevant that um that could be relevant you know at the end of the day veterans aren't themselves doctors so they might suffer from several conditions that are related to their primary claims condition which as we talked about earlier va should in theory be adjudicating in addition to the primary claims condition and because veterans aren't doctors they don't necessarily know how one condition might be related to another so more often than not you're perfectly well served by submitting these additional records even if they contain some irrelevant information um but to the extent that you're able to you should always go through and highlight the information that you consider to be important um especially if you have the opportunity to sort of highlight specific elements like the elements of surface connection that we talked about earlier highlighting current diagnoses highlighting evidence showing that your condition originated in service and then making sure that va has all the information they need to adjudicate the claim from there great and that all that all is very related to the next mistake on the list which is not knowing the law and not understanding the system so from a substantive standpoint what nick was talking about was making sure that your submissions to the best of your ability are limited to relevant information that va is really going to need or want when they adjudicate the particular claim that you are asserting knowing the law is a really big part of that as we were speaking about before veterans will often file claims and lose sight of those three elements of service connection if veterans are seeking disability benefits for um let's say a headache condition or a head injury they might focus a lot on their service records and how their service records mention a head injury or mention some type of head injury residuals or they might focus on service records that show an in-service event and it might be very clear to a veteran a claimant or their family members that their condition is due to service but we can't forget about demonstrating the other elements of the claim including the nexus element so i think not knowing or not understanding or really keeping in mind those three elements and making sure that your submissions really touch on all three can be a mistake it's great if you have service records that pertain to what you're claiming and substantiate the fact that there was an in-service event but again it's really important to be thinking about what are the elements of the claim that you have to prove in the service connection context it's those three elements and so you want to make sure that what you submit is pertinent to all three that va could pick up your file or after the development that they conduct could pick up whatever evidence is in the record and have evidence that speaks to all three elements not just one or two but all three and similarly with increased rating claims veterans are often not aware of how va rates disabilities va has a pretty complex rating schedule for numerous conditions in numerous sections of the code of federal regulations at title 38 all of those resources are helpful so if you're filing a claim for a particular condition it might seem like a daunting task to try to figure out what diagnostic code might apply to you or what rating evaluation criteria va is going to be looking at but if you can take the time to do a search or if you have a code sheet that va has generated associated with one of your awards it might list what code you are rated under and that code can take you to the the criteria for that rating evaluation so that you can understand what va is looking for so for instance the code for headaches is at 38 cfr 4.124 a and that code talks about how different evaluations for headaches are based on how long your headaches last how how much they impair your ability to do occupational functions um they use the word prostrating how prostrating the headache attacks are how frequent they are um again how long they last those are the types of things that va is going to be looking for when they adjudicate your claim if veterans are instead submitting evidence about what kind of medications they require for their headaches or other issues that might not be specifically listed in the diagnostic code then that claim might not result in a favorable outcome because the evidence that's submitted doesn't really speak to the rating criteria so that's definitely a way that can help with your increased rating claims looking at va's rating schedule and figuring out what are the things that va really cares about what are the what are the the type of terms that they're using so that i can try to understand you know what what evidence might i be able to submit that speaks to these terms that speaks to these these criteria these different evaluation levels that really does go a long way we find um sometimes veterans will understandably say well i think it would be best to provide va with all of my medical records about my condition and that should show that i'm entitled to an increase rating but again if you're if you're rated under a code that has very specific criteria those medical records might not speak to all of the elements of the increased rating claim that you need to establish pursuant to the diagnostic code so i would definitely recommend getting familiar with the law that applies to your claim it can be a little bit challenging it can be it can seem daunting for people that have not gone through the process but there's a lot of resources on our website if you google things if you look for things on the internet you can usually find resources to point you in the right direction and another thing that's important to know in addition to the substantive law is the new procedure or the type of appeal rules that apply so if you're in the midst of an appeal process and you're not exactly sure what direction to go in it can be very very useful to read up on the different appeal options that are available to you and what significance each of those appeal lanes carries so we have a lot of resources we've talked a lot before about the different lanes for appealing that are available under the appeals modernization act they have reformed their appeal system and now for um almost two years now we've been operating in the new system where you have three paths that you can take if you want to appeal a decision generally speaking you could ask for a higher level review which doesn't allow you to submit more evidence you could file a supplemental claim appeal which does allow you to submit more evidence or you could file an appeal to the board in any of the dockets at the board including one that doesn't require new evidence one that does allow evidence and one that allows a hearing so there are so many different options available but what option you take is really a decision that you have to make based on what you intend to say or what you intend to submit so it's really important to understand that if you're appealing a decision and you want to submit more evidence you want to make sure you're picking the lane that allows you to do that you wouldn't want to select the higher level review lane because that lane closes to the further submission of evidence and you wouldn't want to appeal to the board's direct docket because similarly that docket does not allow the consideration of new evidence so as you can see there are so many different rules associated with the appeal options and it can be very very easy to make the wrong decision by not understanding what significance those liens carry and what options are available so if you're filing an appeal i think this this also applies if you're filing a claim but if especially if you're filing an appeal it's really important to try to know the law that va is going to be applying sort of the legal lens through which they're going to be looking at your claim what elements they're going to be looking for and also to make sure that you're choosing an appeal path that allows you to do the thing that you want to do if there's more evidence that you want to gather you want to make sure you're picking a lane that's consistent with that if you've already appealed to the higher level review lane you can't do that a second time so that's another thing you have to be mindful of you can't choose that option twice in a row so learning all of those rules again it can seem daunting but it's really important it can save you a lot of headaches on the back end and we have as we've been saying throughout a lot of resources on our website cck.law.com that outline a lot of the substantive legal topics the procedural rules etc um mike i'm going to come back to you the next mistake that we have here is something that you mentioned i think before is when veterans give up on their claims so this can happen if va obtains negative evidence it can be very discouraging when that happens sometimes it can happen if you've appealed something multiple times which is a reality for a lot of veterans who are pursuing benefits multiple denials is not an uncommon part of the process so can you talk to us about how giving up on the claim can be a mistake and how people can avoid that yeah absolutely um this might be out of all of you know the mistakes that we've outlined today um perhaps you know this might be the most consequential um you know it's very easy i think for veterans and you know others to to be confused by the system um it's time-consuming archaic it can um really you know get you down if uh you know you're receiving decision that's a denial after decision that's another denial um that's on top of the fact that you know a huge portion of our veteran clients um they're just trying to struggle on a daily basis to manage their condition to deal with financial hardships um to take care of their family and so it i think it's very easy to get a denial or your third denial and say that's it you know i i tried um i'm done um you know i basically abandoning my claim but i would say if if you really think that there's merit to your claim um you know it's really i think important that you you appeal you continue your claim um and you you know you keep pursuing the claim because like i said at the outset there are significant consequences to abandoning the claim and oftentimes um you know if you have filed a claim and you've been pursuing that claim with appeals ever since that initial claim if ultimately granted you know you could be entitled to a significant amount of retroactive benefits dating back to that date of initial claim and so there's a lot at stake you know service connection can oftentimes lead to securing other va benefits that are very important uh you know to the day-to-day lives of veterans our clients um and just you know in general such as healthcare benefits um such as education benefits all of these other sorts of benefits um in some sense can stem from you know the compensation benefits that you might be pursuing and so you know while it's easy to be discouraged i think it's important to know that this is a oftentimes a long process many times veterans do receive a number of denials before they are able to obtain the right evidence present their case in the appropriate light before the appropriate va adjudicator in order to ultimately um successfully have their claim granted and so i think one thing one mistake that we see that i see oftentimes will be a veteran they will give up on their initial claim that they will file but then they will later file a new claim for the same condition and so that kind of abandoning of the original claim can have significant consequences again in terms of the effective date that can be awarded for your claim so for instance you know a veteran may file for service connection for a back condition um and then receive a decision that denies that benefit veterans typically have one year to appeal any denial but what we'll see is instead of appealing that denial they will essentially abandon or give up on that initial claim and file a new claim perhaps within that one year period for the same exact condition and so why this is problematic is because rather than appealing the initial denial and preserving that initial effective date you know if a veteran submits a new claim many times va will interpret that as a new claim a new effective date um and you know while in certain situation that issue can be corrected in many others va will if the benefits ultimately granted grant the condition from the filing of that second claim and on the veteran was still within that one year appeal period to actually appeal the initial claim denial and so you know that leaves open the potential for veterans to um not receive significant benefits that they would otherwise be entitled to but for the fact that they chose to abandon the initial claim and file a second claim for that same condition and so like i said there are there's a lot at stake whether it's additional ancillary benefits like health care benefits whether it's just um you know monthly compensation and retroactive benefits that the veteran might be missing out on by giving up too early um and just knowing that you know veterans have a right to challenge any denial um they can you know they can go out they can obtain evidence they can submit evidence they can appeal they can likely appeal again if necessary and under the new kind of procedural system that we're living in the the ama system you know as they call it there are a number of new and different options that veterans have to appeal any unfavorable decision and so you know whereas before in years past it might have been a one-size-fits-all very linear approach veterans now have a number of different options that might suit their needs and their claim better depending on the evidence that they need the evidence that they've submitted so i think it's it's just important for veterans to to understand and for for agents to understand accredited claims representatives to understand that um you know oftentimes this process will take some time it will unfortunately probably involve a number of denials and it will involve obtaining evidence submitting evidence making legal arguments and so you know giving up on a claim can really have some significant consequence particularly if you do think that there's merit to the claim um the last part about why it's important not to give up on your claim is because there's help available um whether that's through you know service organizations va accredited representatives attorneys um you know if you know self-help in the form of you know our website blogs information out there um on the internet there's a lot of help that's available to navigate the system it is confusing it is complex it is time consuming oftentimes but there is a lot of help available um it's really important that veterans know that they can reach out and and obtain that help if they are struggling with their case or their claim for giving up on their claim and that was really the last point that we were going to make because it's tough i'm thinking about all the things that we spoke about and it's a lot of a lot of good advice about making sure that you get the right form and making sure you know the law and making sure you are sufficiently detailed in your claim submission but also don't wait too long because va will pick up on some of the details and make sure that you know the options to appeal and make sure that you go through the process of getting denial after denial and making sure that you keep appealing on time and saying what you need to say it is a really tough process it can be extremely discouraging i think it's hard to overstate how frustrating it can be to receive denial after denial of a claim that you know has merit that you really believe in it can be even worse when you're getting you know denials based on a technicality and the new appeal lanes and everything else it's really tough there's a lot going on there's a lot to keep in mind and so mike's last point i want to give you a chance nick too to offer any additional thoughts that you have is is an important one that you don't have to go through this process alone there are people available that can help um and i think that's really important for for veterans to remember and that's why we have it you know as our last primary mistake that we tend to see when handling these claims and seeing these claims come in the door is that veterans often times don't know that help is available to them they do their best to struggle through the claims process but there are dozens of forms with dozens of sections that they need to fill out there are different elements of service connection and many more elements that go into determining the proper rating for the condition and unless you've been working on and studying in the area of veterans law you're just not going to be able to know all of those different things so to that end veterans shouldn't give up they shouldn't just become frustrated with the process and quit um they're entitled to legal representation to assist them with both filing the claim uh and pursuing any appeals they might need to appeal so options for that representation include veteran service organizations like disabled american veterans or accredited attorneys and the accredited attorney's bit is especially important because va has its own process through which it authorizes both attorneys and non-attorney practitioners to represent veterans and you can actually go on va's own website and do an accreditation search to make sure that the person that you're working with is accredited by va but once that you've confirmed that these people are available to help you um and you can often sign up with them using a va form 2122a and once they're authorized to represent you before va they can take over some of the stuff that you might not necessarily be familiar with they can help you to fill out individual forms they can help you decide which form is the correct form to use to appeal your condition and all of those things are available for your assistance if you need it mike and nick thank you so much for sharing your knowledge today we're really hoping that this information was helpful to you all again as we've said please feel free to visit our website visit us on social media for links to additional resources all relevant to what we spoke about today plus some additional things that you might be dealing with in your pursuit of va benefits and finally thank you all for tuning in and we definitely hope to see you again soon take care [Music] you