How to Get Your Doctor’s Medical Opinion Regarding Your Fibromyalgia
When you apply for Social Security disability benefits, the Social Security Administration has to look at your age, education, work experience, and medical evidence in order to determine if you’re disabled and hence qualified to receive benefits. This article focuses on the role that your doctor plays in your Social Security disability claim based on fibromyalgia.
In a medical source statement, your doctor will give the Social Security Administration information that pertains to the level of your medical impairment due to your fibromyalgia. The Social Security Administration will use this information to evaluate your residual functional capacity (RFC).
If the Social Security Administration denies your initial application for benefits, you should get a medical source statement from your doctor about your fibromyalgia when you appeal. This can be used as evidence at your hearing.
Your Ocala disability lawyer will usually wait until after the hearing is scheduled before asking your treating doctor for an opinion. This is because: (1) your attorney will want to fully review your medical file, figure out a legal strategy to pursue, and ask the doctor to support this theory; and (2) the report will still be “fresh” for the hearing. However, this strategy might not work if you change doctors before the hearing or stop seeing your doctor for financial reasons.
There’s another alternative: your Ocala disability lawyer can ask your treating doctor to fill out a medical opinion form as soon as you retain him or her. This will give you an evaluation of your RFC early on. If your fibromyalgia gets better and you can work again, your RFC description can prove to the Social Security Administration that you were disabled for a period of time. If you change your doctors, your attorney can later get a new opinion from your new doctor. If you stop seeing a doctor because the medical costs are too high or your insurance runs out, you will at least have one medical opinion to present to the Social Security Administration.
However, depending on the circumstances of your case, asking for a medical opinion early on may not be the best option. This is especially true if you haven’t been disabled for at least 12 months yet; if you just started seeing the treating doctor; there are some medical uncertainties about your diagnosis; or you have a really complicated case of fibromyalgia featuring a lot of ups and downs.
When you’re appealing a denial of Social Security benefits, your treating doctor’s medical opinion about your fibromyalgia and your RFC is vital. That’s why you should get the help of an experienced Ocala disability lawyer who can help you with the process. Contact Ocala disability lawyer Claudeth Henry today by filling out the form on this page for a free initial consultation.