Pushed by advocates for veterans, the federal government has made it easier for veterans to get disability benefits for post-traumatic stress disorder. They will no longer have to document specific events like battles or roadside-bomb blasts -- as President Obama says, veterans on the battlefield shouldn't have to keep notes. But some of those advocates are now saying the new rule doesn't go far enough:
At issue is a provision saying that a final determination on whether a veteran's disorder is tied to service — instead of, say, a car crash — can be made only by a physician or psychologist working for the Department of Veterans Affairs. Advocates have urged the department to allow private clinicians to make those determinations as well.
Department officials say the provision is intended to ensure consistency in examinations. They assert that mental health clinicians affiliated with the department are likely to have greater experience with P.T.S.D. and be better able not only to detect it but also weed out “malingerers.”
But veterans groups say private clinicians often do more thorough examinations than federal ones. In many of those cases, the private clinicians are already treating the veterans and are thus familiar with their problems.
I dunno. Requiring certification by a physician working for the Department of Veterans Affairs makes sense to me. Aside from the Golden Rule (those who give out the gold get to make the rules), the liberalization of the policy invites abuse -- there are malingerers in any group -- and keeping control of the certification process is a good way of holding it to a minimum.
