Medical Retirement Benefits for US Government Employees: Connections

It is the logical and sequential connections between independent facts, which provide the foundational basis in “proving” a thing.  One can infer or imply; it is indeed possible to extrapolate; but to leave such cognitively-arduous exercise to someone at the Office of Personnel Management is merely to cast it to a chance occurrence.

In preparing, formulating and filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits from the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, whether under FERS or CSRS, it is important to expressly state the obvious — and not just the facts themselves, but the very connections which bind the independent conceptual constructs, and which lead to unmistakable and irrefutable conclusions.

Thus, while it might be obvious to some that if X medical conditions impact Y essential elements of one’s positional duties in the Federal agency or the U.S. Postal Service, it is nevertheless important to emphasize the “why” as well as the “how”.

From a treating doctor’s perspective, such a connection may be so obvious that it need not be emphasized — precisely because of the intimate knowledge which the treating doctor has accumulated over the years and years of reviewing diagnostic test results, through repeated clinical examinations, etc.  But from a case-worker’s perspective at the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, who is reviewing one’s application for Federal Disability Retirement benefits for the first (and possible only) time, repetition of connections is vital to a successful outcome.

How does one metaphorically gain the attention of someone at OPM?  By repetition and making explicit that which may otherwise be implicit and hidden.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire