If you are disabled and applying for SSD benefits, you should hire a knowledgeable Indiana Social Security attorney who will help you meet the SSA’s definition of disability.
An Indiana Social Security Attorney Discusses How the SSA Will Use the Medical Vocational Rules to Find You Disabled
Your Indiana Social Security attorney will go over the following steps the SSA will take to find you disabled:
- Ascertain which work related activities you are still capable of doing despite your impairments. The SSA calls this a residual functional capacity (RFC) assessment; and
- Use the RFC assessment to determine whether you can perform any significant job you have done in the previous 15 years.
If you cannot perform such jobs, then the SSA will:
- Translate the RFC into a work level defined in the Dictionary of Occupational, most likely sedentary, light or medium work; and
- Afterwards, a decisions maker will find your combination of RFC, age, education and work experience listed on a table that indicates whether a claimant with that combination of factors is disabled or not.
Your Indiana Social Security Attorney Explains How the SSA Determines Whether Your Drug Addiction or Alcoholism Is “Material”
If you have a history of alcohol or substance abuse, you and your Indiana Social Security lawyer must ascertain whether going clean would restore your ability to work.
Your Indiana Social Security lawyer may use this example to help you understand your situation: You have a liver disease caused by alcohol, but your ability to work is expected to return if you stopped drinking. In this case, the SSA will conclude that alcoholism is material and find you ineligible for benefits. But if going sober will not restore your ability to work, they will then find the alcohol is not material and qualify for benefits, despite the fact that:
- Alcohol consumption was the root cause of your impairment; and
- You are still drinking alcohol.
An experienced Indiana Social Security attorney can facilitate the SSD application process and explain the Medical Vocational Rules. If you would like a free initial consultation with an attorney, please call the law offices of Martin Barnes at 317-804-5058 today.