APPEALS COUNCIL JOINED BY QUALITY REVIEW BRANCHES

As many know, every hearing decision issued by an ODAR contains appeal right language for a Request for Review by the Appeals Council. In addition to unfavorable decisions, the Appeals Council can, on its own accord, open any decision, including favorable and partially favorable decisions.

As a practical matter favorable and partial favorable decisions are seldom, if ever reviewed, no doubt due to the high volume of unfavorable decisions appealed by claimants. In his 32 years of practice and well over 2,000 favorable decisions Attorney Crawforth has never seen it done on one of his cases.

Now Social Security is instituting 4 Quality Review Branches (QRB) to examine a limited number of favorable and partially favorable decisions as a “quality control”. The 4 QRBs, all located in Crystal City, VA, will review a random sample of 3,500 such decisions each year.

While supposedly random, Attorney Crawforth is just cynical enough to suspect certain judges known for issuing high percentages of favorable decisions may find their cases being reviewed, while those judges who deny a high percentage won’t.

Need another reason to quit smoking? In addition to lung cancer and heart disease there is now evidence that cigarette smoking increases the risk of colon cancer. And because there is a 30 year lag between the onset of smoking and the onset of colon cancer, stopping now won’t make much difference.

According to the Indiana University School of Medicine, there is evidence that smoking is the equivalent of having a first degree relative, such as a parent, sibling or child, in terms of increasing the risk of colon cancer.