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Hi fellow list members, I would like to hear from people who have had good and bad experiences with private long term disability carriers especially Standard Insurance of Portland, OR. I am a physician (psychiatrist) who has been trying to get partial disability from Standard for 5 months. I have had PD for 7 years and unpredictable ons and offs for about the past 1-2 years. I would have to cancel patients sometimes even after they arrived because I went off. On more than one occasion call the office from my cell phone to get someone to come for me with a wheelchair because I was frozen in another part of the building. Other times I would have severe dyskinesia and couldn't even hold ad chart much less write in it. I participated in the Mt. Sinai-Rush-Presbyterian- University of South Florida Double-blind Fetal transplant surgery Study with surgery in March and tried to get disability payments after the 3 month waiting period. The Insurance company claims that since I was supposedly working full time- or at least getting paid for full-time through February that I should have gone back to full-time in June. I have had to spend thousands of dollars in legal fees. My attorneys have been attempting to provide them with what information they don't have but we continue to get delays and non-decisionss 5 months after originally filing for the benefit. There is no doubt that I will win if I take it to court. All I need to do is be a little anxious on the witness stand and my dyskinesia will be for once in my life a decided advantage. But I would like to avoid court if possible and just get the benefits I have paid premiums for and my legal fees reimbursed. I would like to hear from others who have had experiences with disablity insurance claims especially with Standard and also warn people that even a claim as obvious as mine can run into trouble. Thanks; Charles T. Meyer, MD Madison WI