 |
Member
|
|
Join Date: Sep 2006
Location: near Allentown, PA
Posts: 209
|
|
|
Member
Join Date: Sep 2006
Location: near Allentown, PA
Posts: 209
|
allen,
having a vocational "expert" can be either good or bad, depending on how your lawyer handles it.....there was one at my hearing and he and my lawyer got into a real p***ing contest over how u use a cash register, of all things.
this particular 'expert' works for a work/comp insurance co, and can find a job for ANYONE (i swear that, presented with a patient in a coma, he would suggest they find work as a speed bump)....anyway, his suggestions for me were to work in the info booth at a mall (lawyer shot that down because of all the typing of gift certificates), to work as a security guard monitoring screens, or to work as a cashier in a mini-mart/gas station.....the last suggestion is what caused the whole thing to go south.
instead of pointing out that people who work in minimarts have to stock shelves, empty the big trash cans by the gas pumps, etc, he and the lawyer got into this big argument about cash registers representing repetitive motion.....the judge finally got disgusted and ended the hearing....i know now that i should have stood up and asked the judge to throw them both out and presented my own case.
no mention was made of the fact that i'd be very unreliable (good days and bad days, good days that turn into bad days, etc) or that i would need lots of sick time to go for my treatments.....no mention was made of the fact that i'd never pass a drug test, or that the drugs make it unsafe to drive to work....no mention was made of the fact that at my age (i was 55 at the time) it's hard to get hired....the equal opportunity laws make it illegal to discriminate because of age or disability, but that does no good at all unless u can PROVE that u weren't hired becuase of age, etc.
i think the lawyer did a horribly inept job of presenting how sick i was and how much pain i was in....and that's where the focus should have been, not on any job specifics, but on the fact that it's all but impossible to work in constant pain or in a daze from drugs.....this was shortly before the soc/sec policies on rsd were set up, so we were starting from scratch with the judge.
if your lawyer is better than mine (and he could hardly be worse) he will handle the vocational guy in terms of how nearly impossible it would be to work in your state of health, rather than in specific job terms....if u have any doubts about what's being said, please remember that u do have the right to ask for a brief recess so that u can talk to your attorney.
this is longer than i intended, but i really have a bad attitude about vocational experts (and sloppy lawyers, too).....i hope your hearing goes well, and that u (finally!) get your disability.
liz
__________________
best to all,
liz
|