Disability Benefits for Schizophrenia

Receiving Disability Benefits for Schizophrenia

Those with schizophrenia can find themselves unable to work as this disorder can severely limit their ability to engage in normal daily activities and social interactions. By extension, schizophrenia can prevent an individual from obtaining and maintaining gainful employment. To successfully obtain a disability award for schizophrenia, your medical records must not only document your schizophrenia symptoms, they must also document—with specificity—how your symptoms impact your ability to:

• Work
• Stay on task
• Interact with your co-workers
• Interact with your supervisors
• Interact with the public
• Show up for work

In other words, simply stating you are disabled and cannot work is not enough. Evidence of a 5150 hospitalization can provide compelling evidence as well as how long you have struggled with your diagnosis. Schizophrenia can certainly be disabling because it severely limits your ability to engage in normal daily activities. It can be extremely helpful to have an experienced Social Security disability attorney from Carmichael Law Group by your side to present your claim in the best way possible.

At Carmichael Law Group, we fully understand the untenable position you are in. You may be unable to work and financially support yourself, yet also unable to prove to the SSA that you deserve disability benefits. Our attorneys are highly skilled and extremely knowledgeable regarding every aspect of SS disability benefits—we can help you get the disability benefits you need and deserve. It doesn’t matter where you live, we help clients nationwide.

We will do this by first ensuring you meet SSDI’s five-step review process, then showing the impact your condition has had on your life and your ability to work. Correct storytelling regarding your condition, while showing the impact of the condition, carries much more weight than just the “title” of your condition.

Social Security does not pay for partial disability or short-term disability—only total disability. SSA determines whether you are disabled by asking the following five questions:

• Are you currently working? If you are working, and you are consistently making more than $1,310 per month, you will probably not be considered disabled.
• Does your disability prevent you from performing basic work-related activities (walking, standing, sitting, remembering)? In short, is your condition considered “severe?”
• Does your disabling medical condition meet or equal the severity of a listing found in the Blue Book list of medical conditions?
• Are you able to do the work you did prior to your disability?
• Can you make an adjustment to do any other type of work?

What Is Schizophrenia?

Schizophrenia affects an individual’s ability to think, feel, and behave clearly or appropriately. The cause of schizophrenia is unclear, but it appears to be a combination of environment, genetics, and altered brain chemistry. The thoughts and experiences of an individual with schizophrenia can be out of touch with reality. He or she may exhibit disorganized speech or behaviors and may experience decreased participation in the daily activities of life. Difficulties concentrating and memory lapses may also be present.

The treatment for schizophrenia generally involves a combination of medications, psychotherapy, and coordinated specialty care services, and is usually lifelong following a diagnosis. About 200,000 cases of schizophrenia per year are diagnosed and it is considered a chronic condition. There are four major types of schizophrenia: Paranoid Schizophrenia, Catatonic Schizophrenia, Disorganized Schizophrenia, and Undifferentiated Schizophrenia. Residual Schizophrenia refers to a situation in which the majority of the disorder’s symptoms are under control, but residual symptoms still manifest from time to time.