Post by Banjo on Feb 14, 2015 8:03:37 GMT 7
The new process for assessing disability support pension claims
The medical report form will no longer be used by Centrelink to help in the assessment of disability support pension claims. A person claiming the disability support pension will be asked to provide existing medical evidence relating to their medical conditions, for example, x-rays, reports prepared for workers compensation claims or specialist reports.
They will still be referred to a job capacity assessment. However, in some cases, the person will be referred to a further assessment, called a “disability medical assessment”, with a doctor contracted by the government for this purpose (a “government-contracted doctor”). The doctor will provide a report to the Centrelink officer, presumably the officer with overall responsibility for determining the claim (including other eligibility criteria, such as residence, income and assets).
The Department of Human Services website does not say which claimants will be selected for a second assessment. However, the Department of Social Services recently updated its policy about this process and it makes it clear that a second assessment will be used where the job capacity assessment report expresses the view that the person meets the medical criteria for the disability support pension.
This means that the new disability medical assessment process will be applied to people who are found to be medically qualified by the job capacity assessor. Under the previous process, where other qualification criteria have been met, those people would have been granted the disability support pension. They must now go through a second assessment process. Presumably, if the government-contracted doctor disagrees with the job capacity assessor, their claim will be rejected.
Read more: dspoverseas.proboards.com/thread/3670/welfare-writes?page=1#ixzz3Rg1RDNx9
The medical report form will no longer be used by Centrelink to help in the assessment of disability support pension claims. A person claiming the disability support pension will be asked to provide existing medical evidence relating to their medical conditions, for example, x-rays, reports prepared for workers compensation claims or specialist reports.
They will still be referred to a job capacity assessment. However, in some cases, the person will be referred to a further assessment, called a “disability medical assessment”, with a doctor contracted by the government for this purpose (a “government-contracted doctor”). The doctor will provide a report to the Centrelink officer, presumably the officer with overall responsibility for determining the claim (including other eligibility criteria, such as residence, income and assets).
The Department of Human Services website does not say which claimants will be selected for a second assessment. However, the Department of Social Services recently updated its policy about this process and it makes it clear that a second assessment will be used where the job capacity assessment report expresses the view that the person meets the medical criteria for the disability support pension.
This means that the new disability medical assessment process will be applied to people who are found to be medically qualified by the job capacity assessor. Under the previous process, where other qualification criteria have been met, those people would have been granted the disability support pension. They must now go through a second assessment process. Presumably, if the government-contracted doctor disagrees with the job capacity assessor, their claim will be rejected.
Read more: dspoverseas.proboards.com/thread/3670/welfare-writes?page=1#ixzz3Rg1RDNx9