Getting SSDI benefits can involve many parts. For example, you need thorough documentation and evidence to support your claim.
Vocational experts play an important role in SSDI applications. These experts look at your ability to work and give insight into your vocational history, skills and limitations.
1. Assess vocational history
One of the primary tasks of a vocational expert is to assess your vocational history. This involves reviewing your work experience, skills and training. This helps the expert understand your employment background.
By examining factors such as job duties, physical requirements and transferable skills, the vocational expert can figure out the types of work you performed in the past and your level of expertise in various fields.
2. Evaluate functional limitations
These limitations refer to the physical or mental impairments that affect your ability to perform work-related tasks. Through detailed assessments and sometimes by collaborating with medical professionals, vocational experts identify the specific limitations that affect your capacity to work effectively.
3. Provide expert testimony
Vocational experts often provide expert testimony during SSDI hearings. They base their testimony on a thorough analysis of an applicant’s vocational history and functional limitations. Vocational experts help adjudicators understand the complexities of an applicant’s case and how their impairments affect their ability to work.
Ultimately, vocational experts play an important role in disability determinations. Their assessments and expert testimony contribute valuable information to the decision-making process.
By providing insights into an applicant’s vocational background and limitations, vocational experts help adjudicators decide whether an individual qualifies for SSDI benefits based on their inability to engage in substantial gainful activity due to a medically determinable impairment.
