Last Updated on February 19, 2021 by FERS Disability Attorney
In preparing, formulating and filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits from the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, whether under FERS or CSRS, it is the nexus — the connections which are made between any two or more issues, concepts, evidence, etc. — which raises a OPM Disability Retirement application to meet the standard of required proof under the law. Such connections to be made are vital, and determine the success or failure of a Federal Disability Retirement application.
We have all encountered eccentric individuals in our lifetimes — whether of the proverbial “batty-aunt” who talks incessantly about things which nobody understands; or the “flighty friend” who can talk a mile-a-minute about a thousand disconnected issues all in one breath; or perhaps it is a chance-meeting with a stranger who, after a long conversation, one realizes didn’t make a bit of sense in anything that was said. In conversation, one can engage in such language games which have little to no correspondence to reality, and not have to pay a price for such engagement.
In the world of FERS Disability Retirement, failing to make the necessary connections will most certainly lead to a denial of a Federal Disability Retirement application. Thus, the persuasive connection between one’s positional duties and the medical conditions; the argumentative connection between the prevailing law and one’s factual statements; the impacting connection between the medical reports and the entirety of the submitted case; and multiple other connections — each must be carefully crafted.
In a world where we come upon a “noumenal” world (as Kant would state), and where our cognitive categories organize the disparate world we discover, establishing the necessary nexus between X, Y & Z is something which the Federal Disability Retirement applicant should never overlook.
Sincerely,
Robert R. McGill, Esquire