From the Social Security Bulletin, the agency's scholarly periodical publication:
Many homeless individuals with a serious mental illness are potentially eligible for Supplemental Security Income (SSI) payments, but the nature of their impairment poses obstacles to completing the SSI application process. In this article, we evaluate the Homeless with Schizophrenia Presumptive Disability (HSPD) pilot that tested whether providing support during the application process improves SSI application outcomes—such as increasing the allowance rate and shortening the time to award—in selected communities in California. Importantly, the HSPD pilot included a presumptive disability determination that provided up to 6 months of SSI payments before an award. Relative to the comparison groups chosen in the surrounding geographic areas, in an earlier period, and in the same locations, we found that the pilot intervention led to higher allowance rates at the initial adjudicative level, fewer requests for consultative examinations, and reduced time to award. ...
The allowance rate for the entire treatment group was 94 percent, ranging from 87 percent in Northern California to 97 percent in Los Angeles ...
When the government was finally shamed enough to process the disability applications of people with AIDS before they died in the eighties the word went out to Social Security that people with terminal illness diagnosis were to be assumed to be disabled. Lots and lots of folks were approved in months instead of years. Suddenly duplicate records were neither requested or mysteriously lost.
ReplyDeleteAt that time the push to get the applications of people with AIDS done quickly helped all with terminal illness. Social Security workers where I lived got temporarily helpful and reached out to offer help to struggling family members.
If we can do that once we can do it again. it helped that most terminal illness, homelessness and inability to do paperwork was never openly blamed on the terminally ill themselves then.
How low we have sunk...
A 97% approval rate would be scandalous. It would be better if they "aimed for 40."
ReplyDeleteI have seen many people with disabilities who unquestionably could not work denied (and properly so) due to the fact that their disability made them unable to properly document their case. Many people with schizophrenia surely fit into that category, as do people with other impairments causing serious cognitive and social interaction problems.
ReplyDeleteTo get an idea of the scope of the problem, it would be interesting to compare the approval rate in the pilot to that of claimants with similar impairments who were unrepresented and with little or no support network. You would see a very different number.
there are lots of populations that merit disability benefits and would likely result in FF decisions if focused on closely. Do we want to divert resources from the "normal" operations to focus on those? That's a policy decision.
ReplyDeleteUnfortunately, the less than meritorious claims that flood the system cause the claims with merit to be delayed.
To Anonymous @ 4:49 - why do you say "many people with disabilities who unquestionably could not work denied (and properly so) due to the fact that their disability made them unable to properly document their case"? Why do you say "properly so"?
ReplyDeleteThere is an entire project around the chronically homeless, named SOAR, a cooperative effort of the SSA and the SAMHSA (Substance Abuse & Mental Health Services Administration). It is designed for non-attorney case managers to help chronically homeless people to more easily access benefits. Problem is, the program relies in large part on states' having good systems in place for social services for the homeless, and we all know that state funding for such programs is lacking.
People are going to make a mess of the application. I have a client right now who refuses to recognize his schizophrenia and wants to say that he's disabled by virtue of an injury to his arm - an injury that an orthopedist has declined to treat, referring him back to his primary care provider. This guy will never say he has a mental illness, and he'll never get benefits if no one sees him and he just files an application on the basis of a physical impairment.
Properly so because the law requires documentation of the disability in the record before a claim can be approved. SSA places the burden on the claimant to prove multiple things. If the claimant and/or anyone helping them fail to do that, then SSA does not act improperly in denying the claim. There's still plenty of people who lack the capacity to prove their claims without help, who are not getting the help.
ReplyDeleteShades of the old SSI outreach program. Turned out to be too successful.
ReplyDeleteSchizophrenia should be in the compassionate allowance category. It's shameful when SSA denies claimants with documentation of schizophrenia from treating sources. There is no "cure" for schizophrenia. The idea of making such a claimant attend a CE is ludicrous because paranoia is a symptom of schizophrenia and such claimants are unlikely to go to any government appointments. It's laughable to read decisions by aljs finding that schizophrenics can work.
ReplyDeleteI have worked with the families of severely mentally impaired patients to attempt to persuade their loved ones to apply. Usually, the parents of a severe schizophrenic are concerned about what will happen to their adult child once they have passed. The sad part is that many of these people are not so severely (and continuously) functionally impaired that they can be adjudicated as legally incompetent under the severe standards applied in many state courts so as to require a guardian, even though they cannot handle their own finances or maintain housing without assistance. However, by no stretch of the imagination is any employer ever going to hire them. Even relatives who have attempted accommodated employment have often had to terminate the employment of the impaired relative because they were so functionally unreliable.
ReplyDelete