Questions at Your Social Security Hearing

Serving the Western United States

It is important to have a social security claim attorney present during a social security hearing to fight for your interests and rights.  Preparing you for the social security hearing is an important aspect of a social security disability attorney’s job.  The following questions may be asked of you by the Social Security judge or your representative:

Personal and Educational Questions

1. What is your full name?
2. Where do you live?
3. With whom do you live?
4. Do you live in a house or an apartment?
5. What floor is it on? Do you have to climb stairs to get to your apartment? How many?
6. Are you married?
7. When were you born?
8. Are your parents living?
9. How old were they when they each died?
10. What did they die of? (Identifying the cause of parent’s death can be helpful in cases where the claimant is suffering from a related impairment; this testimony may enhance the claimant’s credibility, particularly with regard to such impairments as hypertension or heart disease)
11. Where did you go to school?
12. What grade did you compete in school?
13. Why did you leave school?
14. Can you read?
15. Do you read the newspaper? What section of the paper do you most often read? How often do you read this section?
16. Can you write?
17. Can you do a) addition; b) multiplication; c) division?
18. Did you attend any vocational school or program?
19. When was that?
20. How long did the program last? Was it full-time or part-time?
21. Did you later find a job involving this kind of training?
22. Were you ever in the armed services?
23. Did you ever get special training there? The questions concerning education and vocational training are important in ascertaining whether the claimant possesses any transferable skills, a crucial factor in a Social Security Claims hearing.

Work History

1. When did you last work?
2. Where was this?
3. What was your position there and what were your duties? Please describe your duties in detail.
4. Did you have a supervisor?
5. What did (s)he do? (This question will be relevant in cases of any sheltered-workshop program where the employer subsidized the employment of handicapped or elderly people. Follow-up questions should identify the degree of special supervisory attention that the claimant receives so as to indicate any inability to work indeendelt.y0
6. If you were not closely supervised, how were your duties explained to you? How much did these duties vary from day to day? Did you operate any machinery on your own, read any instructions, or take any measurements of a regular part of your jobs?
7. Could you still do this job? Why not?
8. How long did you work there?
9. Have you ever seen a vocational counselor?
10. What was the result of this visit?
11. At the last hob you had, how much of your time were you standing? How much did you sit? How much did you walk?
12. Did you regularly lift or carry objects? How heavy were these objects?
13. Did you ever have to lift unusually heavy objects? How heavy were those objects?
14. Did you operate any machinery or drive a car on the job?
15. Did you use any small hand tools? What tools did you normally use, if any/ (These questions attempt to classify the previous employment as sedentary, light, medium or heavy work.  If the claimant is currently unable to perform ne light work requirements of former employment, then only the sedentary work grid will be applicable at the hearing.)
16. Does anything prevent you from using both your hands? Does anything prevent the full use of both your eyes or ears? Does anything prevent you from concentrating throughout the right hours of a work day? Does anything interfere with your ability to remember instructions or carry them out? (Although these factors will be investigated further in the course of the medical testimony, it is valuable to identify here all limitations on the claimant’s capacity to perform the full range of sedentary work on a sustained basis.  These limitations could make the sedentary work grid inapplicable to the client’s case.)
17. Going back as far as 15 years ago, please tell us what jobs you performed, starting with the most recent
18. As best you can remember, how much sitting, standing, lifting, walking or operating of tools and machinery did this job require? (The social security claims attorney should ask this question for each job and wait for a precise answer. The regulations provide that “vocationally relevant work” extends back 15 years. It is necessary, therefore, to establish the exertional requirements of each job in light of the heavy/medium/light/sedentary job classifications.)
19. What was the heaviest object you regularly had to lift or pull on any of these jobs? How often would you have to do this?
20. Did you learn to operate any special kind of machinery on any of these jobs?
21. Could you still operate this kind of machinery?
22. Did you receive any special kind of job training?
23. Could you still perform this special kind of work? (Once again, these questions identify any transferable skills the claimant may have acquired. If the claimant’s current impairments preclude the use of such acquired skills, then the transferable skills provisions of the Grid Regulations will not apply.)
24. What was the easiest job you ever had? Could you do it now?

Medical Information Questions

1. What health problems do you have?
2. Taking each separately, tell us about your knee problems:
   1. Do your knees hurt when you walk?
   2. How far can you walk before the pain requires you to sit or rest?
   3. Do you use a cane or crutches? Do you ever use a wheelchair?
   4. Do your knees hurt when you sit?
   5. How long can you sit or stand without pain? (Sedentary work will be precluded if the claimant is unable to sit for a sustained period. Light work may similarly be precluded if the claimant is unable to stand for a sustained period due to the impairment.)
   6. Describe any pain which you experience. Does it feel like being caught in a vise or like being poked with a nail?
   7. What do you do when you have this kind of pain?
   8. Do you lie down, take pills or apply heat pads?
   9. How often do you have to do this?
   10. How long does it take before the pain goes away? (The claimant’s own testimony about the effects of pain will be a crucial factor in the ALJ’s decision about his/her credibility, and about the existence of disabling pain. If found credible, the claimant could secure benefits on the basis of disabling pain alone.)
3. Tell us about your back problems
   1. How many pounds can you easily lift? How frequently?
   2. How long can you stand without pain requiring you tou to sit or lie down?
   3. What difficulty, if any, do you have in stooping to pick up things? Please describe in detail. (Review questions above on pain (2.f – 2.n) as applicable.)
4. Tell us about the hypertension that you have
   1. Do you have headaches? How often?
   2. How is your balance? Do you ever lose your balance?
   3. Do you get nose bleeds? How often?
   4. How long do they last?
   5. Have you ever been hospitalized on an emergency basis? When?
   6. Have you ever been told that your hypertension has an effect on your eyes? Your kidneys? Your heart? (Although it is not necessary to show “end organ damage” to secure disability benefits for hypertension, all indications of organic tissue damage would enable the claimant to show equivalency with the hypertension listings in Appendix 1.)
5. Tell us about any problems you have had with your feet, hands or ankles
   1. What trouble have you had with your feet?
   2. How often does it occur? When did it lat happen?
   3. What time of day does this problem occur?
   4. Can you walk when this happens?
   5. Have you had any trouble with either hand?
   6. Are you able to write, use a screwdriver, drip a steering wheel, or lift a phone book?
   7. When are of these problems occurs, how long does it last? (Such impairments could preclude the full range of sedentary work, rendering he Grid Regulations inapplicable)
6. Tell us about any problems with your ears, eyes or throat
   1. Do you ever have any blurring or vision, or do you ever see double?
   2. Do you wear glasses for reading or for distance?
   3. Even with your glasses on, do you ever have trouble reading?
   4. Do you wear a hearing aid?
   5. How often do you fail to hear things, even with your hearing aid?
7. Tell us about any other problems that you have
   1. Have you been told that you must lose weight?
   2. How much weight are you supposed to lose?
   3. Are you currently on a diet? What sort of diet?
   4. How much weight have you lost since you started?
   5. Have you noticed any loss of appetite resulting from your medical problems?
   6. Do you ever feel anxious for no apparent reason?
   7. Do family members tell you that your moods seem to change quickly and unpredictably
   8. Do you ever find it difficult to think clearly or to organize things? Do you forget things easily?
   9. Do you sometimes find that you get very angry over nothing?
8. Tell us about all the medical treatment you have received
   1. Do you presently have a treating physician?
   2. How long have you been seeing this physician?
   3. Where do you for appointments?
   4. Have you seen any specialists? How many times?
   5. For what specific problems?
   6. Have you ever been hospitalized?
   7. How long were you in the hospital?
   8. What medication, if any, did you receive?
   9. Has the medical problem recurred? When? How often?
   10. What medication do you now take each day? How often do you take it? For each medication, please tell us how much you take each day. Have you noticed any side effects from taking this medication?
   11. Have you ever gone to see a psychologist or a psychiatrist for regular appointments? When?

Daily Activities Questions

1. How often do you cook your own meals? Do you have any difficult in doing this? What kind?
2. When you do not cook for yourself, who cooks for you?
3. Do you make beds? Dust? Do the dishes?
4. When you do not, who does?
5. How long have you been unable to do these things?
6. Do you go shopping? When you go, do you carry any bags? Do you drive a car? If you walk, how far away is the store? How long does it take you to talk to the store?
7. Do you ever visit friends?
8. How far can you walk? What happens if you try to walk father than that?
9. How often, if ever do you use public transportation?

If you or a loved one is going in for a social security hearing, it is important to have a social security claim attorney present for the questioning.  Please contact the Law Office of Fred J. Fleming today to speak with an experienced social security disability attorney today!