Social Security

Your child may qualify for payments from the Supplemental Security Income (SSI) program. With SSI, you may also get medical assistance. We can pay children who have severe health problems, and have limited income and resources.

The health problems must:
(1) be as severe as those that would keep an adult from doing any kind of substantial work. This means that the problems must limit the child from doing the same things that other children the same age would normally do, to the extent required by our rules, and

(2) last, or be expected to last, for at least 12 months in a row, or result in death.

How We Decide If A Child Is Disabled for SSI

First, you must file an application for benefits. Then a State office gets facts about your child's health problems. We usually call this office the Disability Determination Service (DDS). There, a disability evaluation specialist and a doctor (called the DDS team) look at your child's case.

The facts this team looks at can come from several sources. These sources are people who know how your child functions on a day-to-day basis, and over time. They can be doctors and other health professionals who treat your child. They can also include other people such as parents, relatives, caregivers, teachers, counselors, therapists and social workers. The DDS team will try to make a decision based on the medical and other facts they receive from these sources.

If the DDS Needs More Information

The information we receive may not be enough for the DDS team to make a decision. If that happens, we may ask you to take your child to a special examination. We will pay for this examination, and it is very important that your child not miss the appointment. We may deny your claim for SSI payments if your child does not go to the examination and does not have a good reason for not going. During the examination, your child must give his or her best effort. We cannot consider the results of the examination if your child does not give his or her best effort.

About The Disability Decision

The information we collect must prove that your child is disabled under our rules. We cannot make our decision solely on any one of the following:

(1) your belief that your child has a disability; or

(2) the fact that your child is enrolled in special education classes, or is taking certain medications or treatments; or

(3) your child's performance in school. Poor behavior in class or poor grades, alone, are not enough for us to find that a child is disabled.

Appeals

If you disagree with the decision we make on your child's claim, you have a right to appeal the decision. Your appeal rights will be given to you with the notice of our decision.

Our Responsibility

The SSI program is a vital part of this country's commitment to help families with the costs of meeting the special needs of children with disabilities who have limited income and resources. We take seriously our responsibility for administering this program in a fair and compassionate manner. This responsibility includes finding children who might qualify for the program and deciding their claims quickly and accurately.

It also includes making sure that only children who are disabled under our rules receive payments. You may have heard stories about parents coaching their children to do poorly in school or on tests or to misbehave so they can get SSI payments. Our studies show that this is rare, but coaching children to do poorly or misbehave in order to get payments can be fraud. (Fraud can be punished by imprisonment, fines, or both.) While we believe this does not happen often, we do take seriously our responsibility to make sure only children who are disabled under our rules receive payments.

Official Website of the Social Security Administration