LOD "Cancelled" ???

BoSox

BoSox

PEB Forum Regular Member
Background:
Lt Col in the AFRC with 20 yrs of A.D. points (I just crossed the A.D. retirement line).
Deployed to the AOR for 6 months since Nov 10. Paperwork in for a 01 Oct retirement date, life was looking sweet…..

While on a mission in late August of 2011 I injured my neck while pulling crew bags in to the airplane with a cargo strap, aprox. 20 ft in the air. At that time I was on long tour MPA orders. I felt a sharp pain in my neck accompanied by tingling in fingers on left hand and tingling, burning and numbness on back of my head…….most folks will say that is a normal condition for my head :D
While I did experience some minor pain in my neck while deployed this year, it was so minor I chalked it up to a muscle pull and I never sought treatment.

On return to home base I made first apt with Flt Doc and after a few appointments the Doc writes me a script for an MRI which reveals herniated cervical disc in C5-C6 and bulging discs above and below. I was then referred out to pain management where I just received my Cervical Epidurals and prescribed Gabapentin. I am also awaiting an appointment with a Neurosurgeon, scheduled for next week.

The LOD package was started the first week of September. During this period I was still on MPA orders but reduced to a 4 hour duty day because of the pain.

Yesterday, I was informed by the Reserve Flt Medicine Doc that AFRC/SGP and Numbered AF were in town this past weekend giving a road show briefing to Commanders on the LOD process. While on base they reviewed LOD packages for all Wing members.

The result: the Reserve Major processing my LOD was verbally directed to “cancel” my LOD. The reason given to me was that the Doctor’s notes from my initial appointment stated that I had neck pain for 4 months and omitted the bag loading event which actually caused the real pain and tingling in my fingers and neck. Despite my very detailed LOD member’s statement describing the “bag loading event” or the Incident Report on an AF Form 37 which was also included in the LOD package to documented the triggering event, the AFRC/SGP said that there was no triggering event in my medical history. Because there was no “triggering event” in my medical records and because I was able to fly for 4 months with the original neck pain then I am to be presumed fit for duty and not eligible for an LOD.

Of note, I had two previous LODs for a legitimate and documented issues requiring a total of 4 surgeries. The second LOD necessitated an IG and Congressional complaint which I won and I believe the same folks processing this LOD received disciplinary paperwork because their handling of my case .


My Questions:

  1. Has anyone ever heard of an LOD being “cancelled”?
  2. I have requested the treating Flt Doc to amend his notes to include the “triggering incident” but once I have that how do I appeal a “cancelled” LOD since there was no finding?

[FONT=&quot]Thanks for the help[/FONT]
 
What a bunch of crap! First, I have at times heard of things like this happening. Various circumstances and issues in different cases so not really relevant to your case. Important thing is that it should not have happened. I looked in vain in AFI 36-2910 and could not find anything about "triggering events" in there. What I did find was this:


"1.5. When an LOD Determination is Required. The LOD determination process must be
initiated when a member, whether hospitalized or not, has an illness, injury or disease that results
in:
1.5.1. The death of a member. In every case where a member dies on active duty, at a
minimum, an AF Form 348 must be completed. An administrative determination is not
sufficient in a case of death.
1.5.2. The member‟s inability to perform military duties for more than 24 hours,
1.5.3. The likelihood of a permanent disability, or
1.5.4. Medical treatment of a member of the ARC regardless of the member‟s ability to
perform military duties.
1.5.5. The likelihood of an ARC member applying for incapacitation pay"

What strikes me as wrong about this, too, is that they have "by cancelling" your LOD, essentially "decided" that you weren't in the LOD without having the required investigation or by giving you a chance to rebut or add to the case if it were to be an adverse finding. With your years of service and orders status at the time, by application of the 8 year rule, your condition would certainly be in the line of duty.

How to fix this? This is even more difficult, because essentially all you have are chain of command assistance, IG, or Congressional inquiry outside of going to AFBCMR. A problem with the AFBCMR though is that without an determination being completed (whether favorable or not) you have less to work with to "prove" what you should not have to prove.

The saving grace here is that I don't know how much this will matter for you. With a length of service retirement equalling at least 50% of your retired base pay, I doubt your condition (on its own) would push you above that number in the DES. For healthcare purposes, you will be covered by TriCare and/or the VA. And for VA compensation purposes, I think you should clearly be service connected. So, the impact on you may not be that great unless I am missing something.

Congratulations on getting to your 20 years retirement eligibility! (Sorry about the Sox, too! Saving grace there is that the Yankees did not last much longer!).
 
Hello again Jason,

Thank you as always for your detailed response, I don't know how you find time in your day to offer this level of help for so many of us, I know I speak for multitudes when I say that you are truly appreciated.

I try to keep emotions out of this process but it is clear to most of us that the minions at AFRC have been tasked with purging the system of members on MEDCON orders due to the ever worsening budgetary crisis. What amazes me is the utter disregard for the regulations and the member's well being that these henchmen practice as the norm while conducting their "business". I would be interested to know how many of these administrators have deployed or put themselves in harms way during their careers, my guess is never. What is even more frustrating is that when these puppets act in such gross violation of the regulations, they know they can get away with it because they are operating under an umbrella of protection from the same "leadership" that charged them with flushing the injured members in the first place. I have lost complete faith in our institution after having served proudly for 22 yrs, 20 of which were active duty and accumulated over 1000 combat flying hours. OK, venting complete.......

Jason, I too scrubbed the heck out of AFI 36-2910 and your 1.5 reference is actually already in my IG complaint narrative.

Additionally I refereed to AFI 36-2910, 1.8.2 states:
Evidence Considered. When weighing the evidence consider all available evidence including:
1.8.2.1. Direct evidence, i.e., that is based on actual knowledge or observation of witnesses, and
1.8.2.2. Indirect evidence, i.e., facts or statements from which reasonable inferences, deductions, and conclusions may be drawn to establish an unobserved fact, knowledge, or state of mind.

There was a mishap report included as part of my LOD, as well as my Member's Statement in the LOD which clearly detailed the "triggering event" and named supporting witnesses. These knuckleheads latched onto one document and blatantly disregarded the other evidence because it conveniently supported their role of kicking people out the door to save a few bucks instead of keeping the interest of an injured member as the primary goal, which is why these regulations were written in the first place.


While I am very fortunate to have crossed the magic 20 yr mark, my conundrum is this:
My MPA orders terminated at the end of Sep and in light of the LOD "cancellation" I will not be extended on MEDCON orders. This also means no incapacitation pay due to the absence of an LOD finding and of course I'm on the "no point, no pay" medical profile so I can't even trough. As a result of the injury I can not return to my civilian employment, commercial pilot, due to meds, nerve symptoms and pain. So, I have no income other then the potential of a retirement check, which is great, but doesn't cover the bills for a family of five. Maybe more importantly, as of yet I have no determination on the extent of my injuries nor the course of action to correct it, I'm seeing the neurosurgeon this week. If this is going to be something that takes several months to get me serviceable enough return to my civilian job then I need some income and benefits for my family.

My other concern is that past experience has proven how difficult it can be to work within the IG and Congressional complaint systems, the level of difficulty must increase exponentially if you are separated and working your case from "outside" the system.

My plan: file the IG and Congressional and wait for my active duty Flt Doc to return from leave so I can request him to amend his notes. My Commander requested the Reserve Clinic to hold off deleting the LOD until we can speak with the Flt Doc, we'll see what happens there.....if all that does happen then we'll see if AFRC/SGP accepts the additional evidence.

Side note: I'll say this about the BoSox, when they do something, they do it big! What a complete collapse. I feel sorry for Francona, he's playing the scapegoat and it sounds like he wasn't getting support for upstairs. Theo to Chicago? Interesting times in Bean Town. As you say, at least the guys in pin stripes are in the golf cart behind the Sox players.

Jason, thanks again for all your help!
 
I spoke with IG at AFRC today and he was very empathetic, to the point, he used language that left no uncertainty how he felt about my situation....made me feel better about things, we will see what happens from here but he sure seemed genuinely disgusted about my treatment, maybe there are a few good guys left in the system!
 
BoSox said:
I spoke with IG at AFRC today and he was very empathetic, to the point, he used language that left no uncertainty how he felt about my situation....made me feel better about things, we will see what happens from here but he sure seemed genuinely disgusted about my treatment, maybe there are a few good guys left in the system!
Click to expand...

Time to coordinate....
 
Good news, bad news.....

The good: at least these guys are consistent at AFRC including the IG.

The bad: they are consistently incompetent. The IG working my case wound up less than impressive. I think the SG actually made him feel sorry for their office members rather than the injured member. I got quite an empathetic phone call from the IG updating me on his findings, problem is all the empathy was reserved for SG.

"These folks are overworked and there are a lot of people scamming the system, no money in the budget, there are certain things that flag a package like when your orders are running out......"

All the things that an IG should NOT be agreeing with. How about the SG members following USC, DoDI or possibly AFI directives and instructions? How about judging each case on it's own merits without bias? How about who cares about the budget when it comes to members injured ILOD? How about following the regs and if there is question to the validity of the case, let a formal investigation determine that. How about, it's not what the SG wants the regs to say, it is what they actually say and if they don't like it, rewrite them.

Oh, I was told that I could resubmit with additional evidence, that's reasonable since I am independently wealthy, have no military income source and am still too injured to return to civilian employment, thanks for that offer of resubmitting waiting it out another couple of months for a new decision. My family of five will understand their logic when I explain it to them in the line at the soup kitchen.

Of interest to all, and no shocker to the folks on this board, is that the "threshold" for being granted MEDCON orders has increased significantly in the past year. This means that unless your carted away in an ambulance with a wooden stake in your heart (sorry, little Halloween reference there), expect your MEDCON orders to be rejected.

For any members legitimately injured, I would suggest attacking your LOD as a law suit. By this I mean, when you sit down with your local Reserve or ANG medical rep and they ask you for a member's statement, this is no small informality as they would lead you to believe. Come armed with; witness statements, Doc notes, safety reports and the results of any diagnostics (MRI, X-Ray, lab reports), probably would not hurt to site a few of the USC, DoD and AFI regs that you can find posted from Rupture Duck .

Speaking of the Doctor's notes, we the patient do not coord off on the Doc's notes after our appointment so I would heavily suggest that you accurately and firmly communicate to the treating Doc the background of your injury and inform them how important it is to include an accurate description of the event. Again, the ILOD is really no longer an informal process, help yourself by thinking like a lawyer rather than a patient.
 
BoSox,

I completely agree with you. I have a similar situation. Which IG did you go to? After I was demob'ed and denied MEDCON orders, I went to AFRC IG (big mistake!) and I explained how the guys at Scott in A1 were violating AFI's and Title 10 USC and the officer overseeing my case said she "realize what the regs say but it doesn't work that way". I knew at that point they did not have my best interest at heart. They did offer me INCAP pay but I knew that would not work for me since my civilian job was administrative and I could return to that job. Besides, if I didn't return to work and took INCAP pay, my employer would have reason to fire me since I would not be in military status.

I was able to go back to work and have been fighting this and trying to get myself into the DES ever since. The part that will burn them in the end is my LOD was approved before I deployed and during the process, AFRC noted I was not to deploy until my LOD was closed. I deployed before the expiration of my limitation (the ASTS docs cleared me). When I got copies my records in the mail the other day, that e-mail stating I was not allowed to deploy was not there. Good thing I got a copy of it earlier this year.

I had my wife write a nice e-mail to my CC and the Group CC pushing them to take action to help. No response after 5 days so she will write the Wing CC next.

I have sent three letters to my Senators and Congressman this week.

Good luck to you and don't give up!
 
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