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DLA mobilty help

Chrisnew
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Welfare Rights Advisor New Beginnings Liverpool

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Hi All hoping for some expert opinion
DWP emp reports client walks with slight limp,uses walking stick , suffers pain on walking,likely speed 40 metres per minute,can manage within limitation? distance before onset of severe discomfort 300 metres this was all assessed by asking client to stand and walk approx 3 metres in kitchen at home. Client has Oesteoarthritis,COPD,Menieres Disease and Spodylosis.Client has been refused Mobility Component now preparing appeal.


Thanks

Chrisnew

christi
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Advice Services Manager, Thame and District CAB, Oxfordshire

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Chrisnew - 13 August 2010 10:38 AM

Hi All hoping for some expert opinion
DWP emp reports client walks with slight limp,uses walking stick , suffers pain on walking,likely speed 40 metres per minute,can manage within limitation? distance before onset of severe discomfort 300 metres this was all assessed by asking client to stand and walk approx 3 metres in kitchen at home. Client has Oesteoarthritis,COPD,Menieres Disease and Spodylosis.Client has been refused Mobility Component now preparing appeal.

There is no connection between the ability to walk three metres in a kitchen and the ability to walk 300 metres outdoors.  If these facts are genuinely linked in the EMP report I’d say you have grounds for appeal, depending upon what the client reports about his walking to you.

If the client can walk 300 metres, he’s unlikely to be considered virtually unable to walk and ineligible for high rate mobility.  Unless he frequently falls or requires attention for some other reason, he won’t qualify for low rate mobility, and is thus caught between two stools.  He has limited mobility but no entitlement to DLA as a result.

Of course, a lot depends on how easy/well he can walk those 300 metres.  50 metres is an oft quoted figure, but I believe there’s case law saying that distance alone is too simplistic a metric, and gait, speed and pain must also be taken into account.

dbcwru
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Darlington Welfare Rights, Darlington Borough Council

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Chrisnew - 13 August 2010 10:38 AM

Hi All hoping for some expert opinion
DWP emp reports client walks with slight limp,uses walking stick , suffers pain on walking,likely speed 40 metres per minute,can manage within limitation? distance before onset of severe discomfort 300 metres this was all assessed by asking client to stand and walk approx 3 metres in kitchen at home. Client has Oesteoarthritis,COPD,Menieres Disease and Spodylosis.Client has been refused Mobility Component now preparing appeal.


Thanks

Chrisnew


Waht was the clinical examination result within the report? Do you have any medical evidence from clients GP or consultant to support more restricted walking ability? Alternatively with Menieres disease should be entitled Lower rate mobility.

Chrisnew
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Welfare Rights Advisor New Beginnings Liverpool

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EMP states has impairment to right hip ,right knee and Lumbar spine, walks inside supermarket may have to stop after each section.
I saw her stand and walk with stick for a short distance.In section 6 client has reported falls due to dizzys spells EMP states nothing in medical conditions may cause falls !

Chrisnew
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Welfare Rights Advisor New Beginnings Liverpool

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In GPs report he states client has pain on walking at about 40 metres and she needs to stop and rest before she can continue with further stops when needed.

nevip
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Welfare rights adviser - Sefton Council, Liverpool

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I regard R(DLA) 4/03 as the lead case on this matter, particularly the following:

“22. All the aspects of a claimant’s walking are to be considered which result from physical disablement and an evaluation of its quality is then made. This is on the basis that firstly, walking achieved only with severe discomfort is discounted and secondly, that a tribunal must pay appropriate regard to manner, speed, distance and time. This exercise is carried out with the purpose of determining whether, taken overall, the claimant’s walking out of doors is properly described as “virtually unable to walk”.

23. If a stop is the absolute limit of the claimant’s capacity to walk then no issue of taking the test only to the first onset of severe discomfort arises. But if a claimant recovers after a period of rest and continues walking without severe discomfort, then the statutory test does not preclude such continued walking from being assessed. The tribunal must judge from the evidence such relevant factors as how far the claimant can initially walk without experiencing severe discomfort, how long any severe discomfort lasts before it subsides or, if he has paused to prevent such discomfort then the necessary duration of that pause, how frequently these halts recur if at all, and what is the total distance and time he can walk in this manner without severe discomfort.

24. Time, speed, manner and distance of walking, achieved without severe discomfort, are therefore balanced in order to reach an overall judgement on whether the claimant is virtually unable to walk. If a claimant has to rest an hour between each set of walking before severe discomfort subsides, he or she is more likely to be virtually unable to walk than a claimant who requires only 5 minutes. Conversely, if a claimant with morning stiffness through rheumatoid arthritis walks the first minute out of doors in severe discomfort, stops for 4 minutes in order to flex his limbs and thereafter is enabled to walk 10 miles without severe discomfort at a reasonable pace and speed and without further halts, the statutory criteria do not prevent a conclusion which is in no way perverse, that such a claimant does not fall within regulation 12(1)(a)(ii).

25. All of these are matters for the good sense of tribunals. It is not, however, the law that only walking to a first halt required through severe discomfort is relevant. This adds an unjustifiable gloss to the statutory criteria given the broad purpose of the test under regulation 12(1)(a)(ii), which is to establish the practical limitations on a person’s ability to walk due to the stated factors”.

dbcwru
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Darlington Welfare Rights, Darlington Borough Council

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Chrisnew - 13 August 2010 12:04 PM

EMP states has impairment to right hip ,right knee and Lumbar spine, walks inside supermarket may have to stop after each section.
I saw her stand and walk with stick for a short distance.In section 6 client has reported falls due to dizzys spells EMP states nothing in medical conditions may cause falls !

Its worth pulling some information off the Menieres disease website. As well as general ‘imbalance’ sufferers can have ‘drop attacks’ which come without warning. Check if your client has suffered one of these-they will have no memory of being dizzy, may feel like theyve been pushed with force or just found themselves on the floor. My mum has menieres and my knowledge helped me get a much younger client LRM/LRC.

David Richardson
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Bradford Social Services Welfare Rights

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Apologies if you have access to these already but I have found the following site useful. http://www.disabilityalliance.org/digest.htm

Also does your organisation have a copy of Derbyshire County Council Welfare Rights Case law pack?  If not get a copy. If so have a look at pages covering Aids and Prosthesis p186, out of doors p187, distance, speed, time and manne page 188-191.

e.g.One obvious point is that it is walking out of doors not indoors. EMP only tested indoors.

e.g. I have often had tribunals question my clients about walking around supermarkets etc CDLA/12551/1996 covered the case of someone using a supermarket - reminding the tribunal that the legal test is to be applied is of a persons abiltiy to walk out of doors.

How fast is 40 metres a minute - average is 3 miles a hour (or 20 mins a mile)  so its about 0.5 miles an hour.  The DLA form itself has 40 metres as the point between slow and very slow walking. 

Sorry if you have already used the sources mentioned but each specific really does matter. Tribunals often ask what if questions, try to anticipate this. (I hope yours is an organisation that attends tribunals)

Hope you get really good medical evidence. I stoop quite low in begging for it, stating almost how desperate our client is and how we cant pay for it.

Hope this helps.