VA Compensation Takes Time                                     (Continued from Page 3) The denial for Diabetes mellitus type II and with a secondary cause of Peripheral neuropathy of the feet (numb feet) as a result of exposure to herbicides (Agent Orange) was denied because I did not serve in Viet Nam or make a claim within one year, I never said that I served in Viet Nam? What about Korea? I served there and Agent Orange was used there but the government did not recognize this until May 2001. I was officially diagnosed with Diabetes in January 2004. I started with one pill, Metformin HCL, now I take 3 different pills on the maximum allowable dosage plus 35 units of Insulin just to keep my blood sugar between 150 and 200. I had to go to my private doctor to start me on some of these medications to control my diabetes just so the VA would follow suit and prescribe them for a course of treatment for me. 99% percent of people that have diabetes is hereditary, that means someone in your family had it before you. In my case I am the first one in my family to have it, how did I get it is my question, was it herbicides?                                   I have stated before in previous letters that after my initial claim in 1993 after I had received notice that my file was sent to Reno, Nevada due to the Northridge Earthquake, my claim was decided in approximately 10 days. It is truly amazing how a claim could have been decided in such a short period when thousands of files were sent at one time. I assume they worked 24 hours a day, 7 days a week or were they instructed to settle the claims with what they had? After my claim was decided I fell out of the VA medical system for an unknown reason. I was on the Administrative side but not on the medical side for over 8 years all due to my SSN middle two numbers being entered wrong into the system. As most veterans know you state your last name with your last 4 of your SSN, so no one ever noticed the middle two numbers were wrong. Whenever I went to get VA medical help I could not do it as I was not in the medical system. When I finally found out about it and had it corrected that is when most of the other problems were identified. So due to someone putting the wrong information into the system, I am being penalized for not being diagnosed with symptoms earlier. | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 |Next>> [ Back ] [ Tell Your Compensation Story ]