Determining eligibilty for Wintergreen (disability)
Good Morning,
There is some question about who can determine that an applicant meets criteria of having a disabling condition. I have this question, mostly out of resentment that licensed professional counselors and other mental health professionals are required to obtain supervision from PhDs and MD/DOs before diagnosing. But, the reality is...as of this writing:
PART 404—FEDERAL OLD-AGE, SURVIVORS AND DISABILITY INSURANCE (1950- ) of the US Code of Federal Regulations defines "acceptable medical sources" as
§404.1513 Medical and other evidence of your impairment(s).
(a) Sources who can provide evidence to establish an impairment. We need evidence from acceptable medical sources to establish whether you have a medically determinable impairment(s). See §404.1508. Acceptable medical sources are—
(1) Licensed physicians (medical or osteopathic doctors);
(2) Licensed or certified psychologists. Included are school psychologists, or other licensed or certified individuals with other titles who perform the same function as a school psychologist in a school setting, for purposes of establishing mental retardation, learning disabilities, and borderline intellectual functioning only;
(3) Licensed optometrists, for the measurement of visual acuity and visual fields (we may need a report from a physician to determine other aspects of eye diseases);
(4) Licensed podiatrists, for purposes of establishing impairments of the foot, or foot and ankle only, depending on whether the State in which the podiatrist practices permits the practice of podiatry on the foot only, or the foot and ankle; and
(5) Qualified speech-language pathologists, for purposes of establishing speech or language impairments only. For this source, "qualified" means that the speech-language pathologist must be licensed by the State professional licensing agency, or be fully certified by the State education agency in the State in which he or she practices, or hold a Certificate of Clinical Competence from the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association.
10A NCAC 27G .0104 STAFF DEFINITIONS of the NC Administrative Code is broader, allowing more professionals to be "qualified":
(18) "Qualified professional" means, within the mh/dd/sas system of care:
(a) an individual who holds a license, provisional license, certificate, registration or permit issued by the governing board regulating a human service profession, except a registered nurse who is licensed to practice in the State of North Carolina by the North Carolina Board of Nursing who also has four years of full-time accumulated experience in mh/dd/sa with the population served; or
(b) a graduate of a college or university with a Masters degree in a human service field and has one year of full-time, post-graduate degree accumulated mh/dd/sa experience with the population served, or a substance abuse professional who has one year of full-time, post-graduate degree accumulated supervised experience in alcoholism and drug abuse counseling; or
(c) a graduate of a college or university with a bachelor's degree in a human service field and has two years of full-time, post-bachelor's degree accumulated mh/dd/sa experience with the population served, or a substance abuse professional who has two years of full-time, post-bachelor's degree accumulated supervised experience in alcoholism and drug abuse counseling; or
(d) a graduate of a college or university with a bachelor's degree in a field other than human services and has four years of full-time, post-bachelor's degree accumulated mh/dd/sa experience with the population served, or a substance abuse professional who has four years of full-time, post-bachelor's degree accumulated supervised experience in alcoholism and drug abuse counseling.
However, most services can only be performed with the order of an MD psychiatrist or PhD psychologist & diagnosis is made under their supervision.
Another example of The Man keeping us down :-) just kidding
