I am still waiting for someone to tell me how this is really different from what has been going on for years.Michael J. Astrue, Commissioner of Social Security, today announced that Social Security will publish a proposed regulation to extend the quick disability determination (QDD) process to all State disability determination services. The process is now operating in the Boston region, comprised of the states of Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island and Vermont. Under QDD, a predictive model analyzes specific elements of data within the electronic claims file to identify claims where there is a high potential that the claimant is disabled and where evidence of the claimant’s allegations can be quickly and easily obtained.
“At my confirmation hearing, I promised to look closely at the disability changes we were testing in New England and implement nationally those things that were working well,” Commissioner Astrue said. “We have seen the success of the QDD model in identifying cases that are most likely to be allowed. To date, 97 percent of the cases identified have been decided within 21 days and the average decision time is 11 days. We plan to build on the success of QDD by expanding it to all States because it is both efficient and compassionate for us to do so.”Social Security currently receives more than 2.5 million new disability cases each year. In the Boston region, QDD cases constituted slightly less than 3 percent of all new cases because the model does not yet cull a wide enough variety of diseases. Commissioner Astrue has committed to expanding the number of cases that can be decided through the model as high as possible while maintaining accuracy.
“The length of time many people wait for a disability decision is unacceptable,” Astrue said. “I am committed to a process that is as fair and speedy as possible. While there is no single magic bullet, with better systems, better business processes and better ways of fast-tracking targeted cases, we can greatly improve the service we provide this vulnerable population.”
The proposed regulation provides for a 30 day comment period. It is on display at the Federal Register today and, starting tomorrow, can be read online at www.regulations.gov. For more information about Social Security’s disability programs, go to www.socialsecurity.gov
Jul 9, 2007
Press Release On QDD
A press release from Social Security:
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6 comments:
I agree. This is nothing new. I used to work at the DDS and the field offices did a pretty good job flagging cases that carried an allegation of cancer, low birth weight, dialysis etc. These cases were assigned immediately. However, you did have a "few" disability analysts that sat on these cases or analysts had trouble in obtaining the records from the treating sources to adjudicate the claim in a timely manner. In some instances onset date was an issue. The claimant alleged a certain onset date; however the treating sources would only send/fax records they thought were important, thus more calls to obtain more records around the alleged onset date delayed the case.
Not much of a difference but in theory, the QDD process should allow more allowances based primarily on a diagnosis provided by an acceptable medical source with little if any ancillary medical evidence, ie. the good ole "signs, symptoms, and objective findings".
While the theory is nice and the obviously disabled may get quicker decision, QDD does nothing to help the overall time to get a decision. In fact, other cases may get short shrifted since the DDS analyst's time and attention is diverted away from non QDD cases. Any time the agency decides that a certain workload is a priority, it always means other workloads get less or no attention. More staffing is what is needed.
like polishing the silverware on the titanic
It is a smarter way of processing cases that are obvious allowances. Why spend the same amount of time processing the easy cases as the more complex cases?
Without more experienced DDS staff on board, reshuffling the priorities of which cases get worked first is a zero-sum gain. If the 3% of "QDD cases" get worked a little faster, it just means that the remaining 97% of cases will get worked a little slower.
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