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Any traumatic event can produce long-term effects for the participants, but those in the military often encounter repeated, high-level traumatic incidents on a regular basis, particularly if they are deployed in a combat zone. The human psyche is not equipped, nor is there any effective way, to process traumatic events for many individuals. Classified as […]

Proving one has a disabling condition is only half the battle when seeking Veteran’s Administration (VA) disability compensation benefits. Unlike SSDI, the amount of compensation a claimant receives is not based on earnings alone but is directly linked to the disability rating assigned, which represents the level of social and occupational impairment the VA believes […]

Disabilities can enter a person’s life in a variety of ways and at different times. Disabilities related to military experience can be particularly tricky to pinpoint because of the different environments a service member may encounter and the extreme circumstances they may have to face. Military personnel can experience the onset of a disability while […]

Last Tuesday the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit handed a major victory to Vietnam veterans who served offshore in Vietnam’s territorial waters. Since the late 1990s, the VA has excluded the group known as “Blue Water” veterans, who served offshore, from receiving a presumption of agent orange exposure, and thus a presumption of […]

Military Sexual Trauma (military sexual trauma) is psychological trauma, which results from a physical assault of a sexual nature, battery of a sexual nature, or sexual harassment and which occurs while a veteran is serving on active duty, active duty for training, or inactive duty training. It happens more often than many people know – […]

Earlier this month, attorneys working with the Yale Law School Veterans Legal Services Clinic filed a class action law suit in federal court alleging that the Navy illegally denies requests for discharge upgrades made by veterans with PTSD and other mental health conditions.   The lead plaintiff is a Marine veteran of the 2003 invasion […]

I recently had the opportunity to sit down with Attorney Ferah Ozbek, a fellow veteran, to discuss my VA benefits practice and PTSD. Farah served in the U.S. Air Force as a judge advocate for 22 years, attaining the rank of Colonel. She now runs the website MilitaryLawMatters.com, which matches clients with military law attorneys. She […]

New DoD Guidance for Discharge Upgrades Involving Mental Health As I have noted before, service-connected mental health conditions frequently lead to veterans receiving other-than-honorable discharges. In turn, other-than-honorable discharges often prevent veterans from receiving much needed VA benefits and health care. In response to this problem, the Department of Defense (DoD) has issued new New […]

Big changes are coming to the VA appeals process as a result of a new law, the Veterans Appeals Improvement and Modernization Act of 2017, which became law on August 23, 2017. The new law restructures the current appeals process to address the massive backlog of veterans presently waiting for decisions on their appeals.

In a change to longstanding policy, the VA will now provide emergency mental health care to veterans with other-than-honorable (OTH) administrative discharges. As of July 2017, all former service members suffering from a mental health emergency may access the VA health care system by visiting a VA emergency room, an outpatient clinic, or a vet […]