Could You Get Financial Help from Social Security Disability?
Do you live in Phoenix and wonder if you have a strong case for Social Security Disability benefits? When health problems disrupt your life, benefits provide financial help you need to support yourself and recover.
To qualify for disability benefits, you have to meet strict rules:
- You have serious health problems.
- You can’t work because of your health problems.
- Your health problems and inability to work are likely to last a year or more.
Social Security has two different disability programs depending on your work background and financial situation:
- Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI) is for people who worked and paid Social Security taxes, earning coverage for job disruptions due to health problems. It’s not a handout but a type of insurance for working people. You can have savings and other financial resources and get SSDI, just not too much income from working.
- Supplemental Security Income (SSI) provides financial help for people with little income or economic resources of different kinds like savings and investments, and it doesn’t require a work history like SSDI.
Qualifying for Social Security Disability benefits is complicated. Usually, you have to get denied and appeal the decision.
In Phoenix you can work with highly experienced disability lawyers to help you through this process. You pay no attorney fee until you win benefits.
Slepian Ellexson has helped thousands of people in Phoenix for almost half a century.
Contact us to learn more about how you might qualify for disability in Phoenix!
How to Qualify for Disability in Phoenix
The Social Security Administration lays out five steps to qualifying for disability benefits.
Step 1: Not Working
You must be unable to work full time to win Social Security Disability benefits. If you are working part-time, you can’t earn too much. Social Security has a cutoff called “substantial gainful activity” or SGA. It’s a monthly amount that adjusts each year. If you earn more than SGA, you won’t qualify for benefits, no matter how serious your health problems are.
Step 2: Proving that Your Medical Condition Is Severe
You must prove that your health problems are severe enough by demonstrating that you won’t recover for at least 12 months. That doesn’t mean you have to be off work for a year already when you apply for benefits, only that your medical records make it clear it will be a year.
Step 3: Identifying Your Medical Condition on Social Security’s List
Social Security keeps a list of impairments that qualify for disability benefits. Over 100 medical diagnoses are on the list. Sometimes it’s called Social Security’s “Blue Book.” The list spells out medical evidence, exam results and test results that you need to prove you should be approved for benefits.
Step 4: Demonstrating How You Can’t Do Your Previous Work
If your condition isn’t on the list, you can still qualify for benefits. You need to show how your medical condition intersects with the kinds of work you’ve done in the past—and how your particular symptoms now rule out doing that work. You can have a medical condition that may qualify, but it must be something that blocks you from doing your past work.
Step 5: Convincing Social Security that You Can’t Do Any Work
Social Security Disability is strict. Not only must you be unable to do your past work, you must be unable to do any job that exists that your training and experience would otherwise allow. If you could switch to a less physical job, for example, they’ll deny your benefits. Your age also matters. Winning benefits gets easier over 50 because your chances of getting jobs you’ve never done before are lower.
To find out where you stand in qualifying for disability benefits in Pheonix, get a free evaluation from our Phoenix disability attorneys.
Does My Health Problem Qualify for Disability in Phoenix?
This may be the first question you have. People often think of “disability” as a certain kind of impairment, something that visibly alters a person’s movement or behavior and requires devices like wheelchairs.
If you have a diagnosis that limits your ability to work but still doesn’t fit a common image of “disability” you wonder, “Does my medical condition qualify for Social Security Disability?”
Remember that Social Security looks at disability in a highly particular way. Their definition of disability is inability to work.
Winning disability benefits breaks into two major parts:
- Showing that you have a medical condition that Social Security officially recognizes.
- Showing that your symptoms—no matter the name of your medical condition—prevent you from working full time.
As part of this process, Social Security determines your “residual functional capacity” or RFC. This includes how long you can sit, stand, walk, reach, hold and carry objects, and how long you can focus on work. If your RFC is so limited that it would make full-time work impossible, you win benefits.
Many health conditions, when severe enough, can meet the standard for disability benefits. The Phoenix disability lawyers at Slepian Ellexson see Arizonans with these and more health struggles:
- Anxiety
- Arthritis
- Back problems
- Bipolar disorder
- Cancer
- Carpal tunnel syndrome
- Chronic fatigue
- Chronic pain
- Crohn’s disease
- Depression
- Diabetes
- Ehlers-Danlos syndrome (EDS)
- Epilepsy
- Fibromyalgia
- Heart disease
- Irritable bowel syndrome (IBS)
- Liver and kidney diseases
- Lupus
- Multiple sclerosis (MS)
- Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD)
- Postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome (POTS)
- Reflect sympathetic dystrophy (RSD)
When your health takes a turn for the worse for any reason, and you can’t earn a livelihood, contact the Social Security Disability lawyers at Slepian Ellexson to see if you qualify for disability in Phoenix and get help reaching a more secure future.
