Social Security Holds Third Disability Hearing on Compassionate Allowances

from The Military Family Network:

Experts Provide Testimony on Traumatic Brain Injuries and Stroke

The Social Security Administration, in conjunction with the United
States Department of Defense, held a public hearing on Compassionate
Allowances today at Ft. Myer in Arlington, VA. Senior executives from
the Department of Defense and the National Institutes of Health joined
Michael J. Astrue, Commissioner of Social Security, to hear testimony
from some of the nation’s leading experts on traumatic brain injury,
the signature injury of the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan, and
stroke.

“Compassionate Allowances, which we launched last month with an
initial list of 50 conditions, allows us to make disability decisions
on certain categories of cases in a matter of days, rather than months
or years,” said Commissioner Astrue. “Today’s hearing gives us
additional insight into how we might better recognize and fast-track
the disability applications of veterans and others dealing with the
effects of traumatic brain injuries and strokes.”

Compassionate Allowances are a way of quickly identifying
diseases and other medical conditions that invariably qualify under
Social Security’s disability standards based on minimal objective
medical information. Today’s hearing is the third of four public
hearings Social Security plans to hold.

Previous hearings dealt with cancers and rare diseases and
resulted in the nationwide launch of the Compassionate Allowances
initiative in October 2008. See the press release at: http://www.socialsecurity.gov/pressoffice/pr/compassionate-allowances-1008-pr.htm

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