Canadian pension plan disability

[LeanCat]

Any Canadians here receiving CPP disability retirement?

I will be turning 60 next year and thinking of retiring. I’m wondering if anyone here has been accepted because of their PBC on the disability plan. Your help or any info would be greatly appreciated,

Thank you,

Kathleen

[YvonneGS]

Yes, my husband has it. He is on disability from work for PBC and also had to apply for CPP disability to offset that portion of the company plan since he is 61. There was no issue...just more paperwork. The key is to have a thorough doctor who is meticulous with the paperwork since PBC is still considered rare. Hope it works out for you!

[LeanCat in reply to YvonneGS]

Thank you YvonneGS for your reply, raises my belief that it can be done.

With gratitude,

Kathleen

[YvonneGS in reply to LeanCat]

No problem at all! We are here to support one another. I was honestly amazed how simple it was, but again, I believe the key is in how the doctor fills in the paperwork. The specialist did not do it, but referred it to his GP to complete, and she is wonderful! We actually owe her our thanks for spotting the liver issues to begin with, even though he’d had bloodwork many times over the years with other docs. He was not diagnosed until Stage 3/4, unfortunately, and it is believed he had PBC for at least 10 years prior to being diagnosed. His GP had to refer us to a GE twice as the first one did not have a clue about PBC! He just insisted my husband was a drinker, which was laughable! My guy might have had a beer twice a year, at most! After 6 months of stupidity, we asked the GP for another doc and she immediately referred him to his current GE, who is great. So we have much to be thankful for, and he is relatively stable at the moment. I hope you are successful in getting disability. The fatigue, itch, and HE can make work impossible. Being home has really made his life so much better. Wishing you the best, Kathleen...

[YvonneGS in reply to YvonneGS]

As Lucky4 mentioned, we also printed off info about PBC and its affects on daily living/work ability. The GP included that with the paperwork and was very succinct in her written portion of the applications for work and CPPD that he would NOT be getting better as there is no cure, only hope of stabilization which was still not enough for him to be able to continue working.

[LeanCat in reply to YvonneGS]

Thanks Yvonne, I don’t know how easy it’s going to be for me with the medical form as I have just found out last week that m GP is no longer practicing. I just couldn’t believe it when I found out as this GP was my 5th one since I was diagnosed in 2011...they’re all retiring or moving away....geez! Can I ask where you live?...I’m in Calgary, Alberta.

[YvonneGS in reply to LeanCat]

In that case, maybe your GE or Hep doc will do the paperwork then. We are in Kingsville, Ontario...near Windsor.

[Lucky4]

Hi Kathleen,

I'm on it. To be honest, the whole thing was very stressful and I ended up with $600 for one year while all of this went on. Where I work, just about everyone is turned down for disability so I waited months then got a wonderful woman from my union where all she does is help people with their applications. She put together a novella about me, the illness, the doctors wrote thorough supporting documentation and it went through.

As Yvonne mentioned, with these work ones, you apply for CPPD at the same time you apply for the work disability. For me, once turned down from work disability (like most people), the CPPD was turned down. However, a year later, when the work one was accepted, with all the documentation and physician support, the CPPD went through. The CCPD is deducted from my work disability.

It does take a long wait and the more information you can provide, the better. With CPPD they're looking at permanence and significant impacts on day to day functionality. It also helps to provide educational information (article or research about PBC) that you can include is good. If fatigue is an issue then how does this affect cognitive ability, memory, etc. or ability to do self-care, any work around the house, etc.

Wish you all the best with it.

[LeanCat in reply to Lucky4]

Thank you Lucky4 for the helpful information. I now think it’s worth trying for it, wasn’t sure before if it would be worth all the work. Could you please let me know if the medical form was done by your family doctor or your hepatologist. Again your help would be appreciated.....

[YvonneGS in reply to Lucky4]

So glad you won your fight for it! Some companies put employees through the ringer...just what you don’t need when you are battling an illness! Wishing you all the best...

[Lucky4 in reply to YvonneGS]

Thanks Yvonne. It was an extremely tough year as I was also recovering from major surgery with severe complications then had another surgery with complications. Survived it. Fortunately my husband saw me through as I've heard some bad stories about people in healthcare unable to work and after the initial turn-down ending up in a really bad situation. My union could not have been better. I owe the success to my disability advocate who put in a tremendous amount of effort (we sent her a big bouquet when we learned it was approved). Anyway, grateful that it turned out well with the disability. I hope that for others who apply for disability with this illness, or any other, that the applications become easier as more is understood.

[Flowerwh]

Hello,

I’m a fellow Canadian in Ontario. My father and husband are both on or have been on long term disability for other illnesses. As everyone says here, get your physician to be very thorough. My father ended up needing a lawyer to help when he was turned down. I am early in my PBC journey but work full time supporting my whole family, which is quite worrying. . I am also concerned how long I will be able to work due to various symptoms. I hope I improve with URSO. But should I need to retire early on disability someday, I worry how well-known this disease is. My husband has progressive MS so for him getting CPP and work long term through Manulife was very straight forward. Hopefully, increased awareness of our condition will help the process. Wishing you all the best of luck. If you do apply, tell us about how it goes.

[Lucky4]

Hi Kathleen,

I had very supportive documentation from both my GP and Gastrologist. My GP's son, who was a medical student at the time, put a huge amount of time into researching it and putting together some good documentation so I was lucky. My work site is known for people getting turned down for disability (I worked in healthcare); oh, the irony. My GP said it was easier to get someone on disability for depression than PBC.

I "fired" my gastologist after finding out that after us never talking about my work functioning or how I was doing, other than lab tests, he said I could work part-time. He never once discussed that with me. That was part of the reason I was turned down. My colleagues thought I should be on disability as they saw I just wasn't able to manage a pretty high stress/high demand job. So, once I got my new gastrologist, she was great and really assessed the situation so that helped tremendously. I'd suggest you discuss with both exactly what all the issues are and provide a list of the impacts (being cued from the questions on the application form). I also included information about intractable fatigue coming at any time in the illness (at that time but not now my labs were better).

You may want to call CCP about the process and how long it takes. It takes forever to get through on the phone with no appropriate selection but when I selected the "help looking for a job" or something like that, someone would answer; an actual person. Hey, whatever works.

Good luck with it!