Atos and medical diagnosis.

Hi,

I am not going for a mandatory reconsideration this time as my award is now nearly two years. I had made a complaint to ICE regarding my assessment and they delayed this considerably putting it down to Covid although my complaint was made well before the pandemic. They have just come back to me and decided not to uphold my complaint which is not surprising.

My review was due at the end to this year but it has been extended although I could get a letter any day going by what others have experienced.

I am preparing for the review in advance so that I do not have to rush at the last minute.

In a previous reply i was advised to get a letter from my GP in his specialist capacity confirming my mental health and the medication prescribed to manage it which ATOS in the their last assessment were disputing saying their was no specialist input and disputing the two medication prescribed were for my depression and anxiety because apparently these medications are also prescribed for other conditions.

As mentioned my GP has been kind enough to supply mw with a letter so hopefully this will to the satisfaction of DWP and ATOS as confirmation of specialist input. Although, I will not at all be surprised if they dispute this as well!!

As mentioned my GP had already mentioned my mental health in his previous letters and I just wanted to if this should have been taken as specialist input rather than being disputed. If, so I wanted to highlight this fact in my review so that both DWP and ATOS are aware and look at all my medical reports and GP letters in details rather than overlooking as they may have most likely because their are a lot paperwork involved.

This is the reason I was seeking advice as I want make sure I do this right and not give them excuse of giving wrong information.

Hi Hari. At my last renewal I sent an Appendix (along with the form) which included photocopies of medical notes/ hospital / counselling / psychotherapist letters since year dot.
I placed them all in date order (now going backwards into the past) and put a front sheet which stated dates and what the evidence was:
10.10.20 Hospital letter
20.02.19 GP notes
Etc etc
It gives them a timeframe to flick through and shows longevity.
*They do not read things*
Make things as easy as possible for the assessors. You will have to trawl through your GP notes and also dig out any referral letters etc you may have.
FUNCTIONALITY and ‘majority of the time’ are what you need to concentrate on.
Put the work in now. Hopefully that will make things easier. Good Luck.