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paulfromatlanta t1_je9tqjf wrote

VA (probably): Hearing loss not related to service...

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Late_Sink_1576 OP t1_jeawikw wrote

They absolutely said that. Even after I appealed. But they only ever used their own audiogram. My appeal did increase my overall rating to 100%, so I didn’t bother pursuing it with the VA anymore.

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ar243 t1_jeayov3 wrote

What's even the point of the VA? I've only ever heard bad things

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Late_Sink_1576 OP t1_jeb0bnq wrote

You know, for all their failings, I have excellent healthcare. We had a saying when I was still in the service: “Where you’re going is the best place you can go, where you are is the worst place you can be, and where you came from never really was that bad”. It’s about duty stations, but speaks generally to the notion of contentment and hindsight.

Since my disability rating totals more than a specified threshold, my healthcare is free for me forever, service-connected or not. I have socialized healthcare. And it’s awesome.

I can walk in to see my doctor unannounced. I can phone in or email prescriptions I never pay for. I have not known a medical bill, copay, or premium since 2010 and never will again.

The VA has its flaws, and had made good progress since the influx of OIF/OEF veterans filled its facilities with youthful anger. The mental health care has dramatically improved. I won’t sing their praises more than that. I just don’t feel I’m in a position to really complain about the VA when medical debt can ruin your life.

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ar243 t1_jeb2z1f wrote

Very interesting. Thanks for the insight.

Just curious, what did you do in Iraq? Like were you a tank commander or a cook or a logistics officer or something?

I was born in 1996 so I didn't really understand what was going on in the middle east at the time we invaded.

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Late_Sink_1576 OP t1_jeb440m wrote

Ordnance Corps.

I know why I went, but I still don’t know why we went.

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ramblingrelic t1_jeb1mfs wrote

Wait until you're issued hearing aids and they do audiologist appointments with someone that's 500 miles away, on a webcam, tuning your hearing aid remotely and you can't hear crap to begin with. Or PT in another town and you don't get an overnight...oh so many stories. Gotta love that VA! The VA advocates rock though.

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Sheamus_1852 t1_jeb5zk9 wrote

Did the same for me. Still got 10% for tinnitus.

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Late_Sink_1576 OP t1_jeb663w wrote

Did you use the CAEv2 plugs?

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ramblingrelic t1_jeb98z2 wrote

Oh those bring back memories. Tbh, the orange triple-flange ones that you screwed into your ears with the case were less effective. I always kept handfuls of the foam ones our armorer handed out like Halloween candy.

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geauxtigers77 t1_je9zhrj wrote

Lol as someone going through the VA claim process right now, I feel that last part of the timeline hard

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Late_Sink_1576 OP t1_jeavhlk wrote

My dude, KEEP YOUR RECORDS! You can appeal a VA rating decision within a year of it’s posted date. Compensation will backdate to the date of initial rating instead of the date of appeal if your rating is increased.

Also, it’s an absolutely pain in ye’ ol’ donk-oh-donk, but go through the process of setting up your access to ebenefits and iPERMS. You can access a lot of records there the vVA won’t bother to include in your case

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ramblingrelic t1_jeb1wsi wrote

Hijacking. Meet with your VA advocate too. The VA hospitals have an advocate and they can hook you up with the VFW or the Legions. They can, and will, do the heavy lifting for you if you ask when it comes to paperwork and appeals.

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Late_Sink_1576 OP t1_jeb30pj wrote

THIS! I was fortunately enough to be hand carried from office to office by my VA Advocate when I was enrolling in the VA. That system is a labyrinth, and they are your guide.

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fresh_haggis t1_jeb70kr wrote

Note: Evaluations for service connection are performed by the Veterans Benefits Administration (VBA) not the Veterans Health Administration (VHA). Folks in the VHA are the front line clinicians providing clinical care to Veterans. A service connection assessment by the VBA is explicitly NOT treatment, it is an eval to determine whether disability, injury, condition, etc is least as likely as not to be related to service. The clinical services provided by the VHA is an easy thing to crap on because who would disagree with the statement that we need to take care of Veterans. I work in addiction treatment in the VA and I wish civilians had the immediate and continuous access to addiction treatment that the Veterans at my VA are able to use. Sometimes it takes multiple 21 day residential intensive outpatient treatment episodes to achieve something that resembles recovery. It isn't perfect but a helluva lot better than private insurance (at least for MH and addiction treatment from my perspective).

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vk6flab t1_je9sw8n wrote

It appears that you were lucky and your hearing seems to have recovered.

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Late_Sink_1576 OP t1_je9t2ky wrote

My hearing didn’t recover. My hearing loss claim was denied, is all

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Flowchart83 t1_je9x7hr wrote

I think he's referring to your VA disability exam scoring better than your post deployment exam. Do you suspect the last exam was falsified to avoid paying out?

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Late_Sink_1576 OP t1_jeaslwl wrote

Yeah, I was given an H-3 hearing profile shortly after returning from deployment, but never given a follow up because I was being chaptered. All of my VA numbers seemed suspiciously close to the cutoff threshold for compensation.

I’m not saying the VA lied, but I’m not saying I trust them either.

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Late_Sink_1576 OP t1_je9smo5 wrote

Data was pulled from documents in my military 201 file, Army medical records, and VA examination documents.

Graphics in Inkscape.

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cutt2010 t1_je9tvm4 wrote

We should have worn our earplugs... wait, those didn't work either.

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eagle_565 t1_je9ufx8 wrote

On the green line does it say you could hear 500hz at 0 decibels? Surely 0 decibels means no sound is being produced

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Late_Sink_1576 OP t1_jeb1jet wrote

Ok, so audiograms have the y,-axis inverted to show hearing loss as a downward graph. 0dB refers to the calibrated baseline volume. Each non-zero value states how much volume must be added from baseline to hear the pure tone frequency.

Edit: u/eahle_565 asked a good question. Upvote curiosity, you pessimists bastards! Everyone who hated school or believes they’re not “math people” had a teacher just like you! 🖕

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DuplexEspresso t1_jea6z91 wrote

How about 3000hz at the green line ? Negative dB ? They mean surely 0 dB is not absolute silence, hence there is sound being produced at 0 dB.

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tonysansan t1_jeafj59 wrote

Two points here. First, 0 dB is the reference level of sound, in this case the threshold of hearing. This typically corresponds to a sound pressure of 0.00002 Pa, which is a very faint sound. Second, to read an audiogram, the y-axis is the softest sound heard at least 50% of the time.

So the data point at 3000 Hz of 40 dB is not a negative value. It means that a tone at 3000 Hz has to be at least 40 dB loud (about the level of a refrigerator humming) for him to hear it.

What you don’t see in a simple audiogram is that quality of life is not just about picking out tones. When the higher frequencies over the range used in speech drop out like this, it becomes harder to understand and pick out words in conversation.

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algernon132 t1_jeapigo wrote

The dB scale is logarithmic, I believe -♾️dB is no sound

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