This question brought a reader to my blog recently: Can a lawyer represent a claimant for a Social Security initial determination?
The answer is yes. You do not have to wait until you receive a denial letter to seek the help of an attorney.
There are some good reasons to get a lawyer involved early
Sometimes a denial of an initial Social Security disability application is due to something of a time lag between your medical condition and your medical records.
Unless your impairment had a sudden onset, it can be difficult to determine from your medical records when a condition became disabling. Particularly for those who apply for
Every other Friday, we round up notable articles from the Social Security disability blogs. Here is today's installment:
The first 3 months of 2010 brought many posts to this blog. Here are 5 of the most useful, in case you missed them:
In a recent blog article entitled Another Reason You May Be Denied Your Social Security Disability Benefits, Indiana Social Security disability attorney Tom Ebbinghouse makes an excellent point regarding denials of Social Security disability claims by the various DDS agencies determining Social Security disability and SSI claims. [These agencies are known by slightly different names
I just received an on the record decision from the Portland Hearing Office for one of my clients. An "on the record" decision is a fully favorable decision granting the claim on the record without a hearing.
What is notable about this particular decision is that it was made on the exact same record evaluated by
Every now and then I see a claim involving mental impairments where the GAF score assessed in the clinician’s treatment notes is higher than you want to see as a disability lawyer.
A GAF score of 65, for example, normally would not denote a disabling mental impairment. However, most of the GAF scores in a disability
Every two weeks, we round up articles of note from the Social Security disability blogs:
The latest statistics for average processing time have been released by the SSA. The Portland Maine Social Security hearing office has a waiting time of 326 days, or about 11 months, for a decision.
Processing time runs from the day the hearing office receives your hearing request to the day a decision is issued. The 326