U.K. PARURESIS TRUST

UK paruresis trust

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Incapacity Benefit and Paruresis

Posted by John Smith on 28/9/2009, 11:41 am

Hi

Can anyone tell me if Paruresis is recognized for incapacity benefit claims? I know they have clamped down recently on depression/social phobia claims on the basis that you are better of at work! Fair enough but what about paruresis? If you have that on your forms or sick-note? Will they even know what it is? Does anybody have any experience of claiming incapacity benefit because of paruresis?

Thanks.

Re: Incapacity Benefit and Paruresis

Posted by Mark L on 28/9/2009, 10:02 pm, in reply to "Incapacity Benefit and Paruresis"

Hi,

A very good question! I am also intrigued to know this, hopefully Andrew will enlighten us soon enough.

Mark

Re: Incapacity Benefit and Paruresis

Posted by Andrew on 30/9/2009, 1:46 pm, in reply to "Incapacity Benefit and Paruresis"

Hi John

I am not sure: my only in-depth experience was helping someone in Scotland deal with an appeal against loss of incapacity benefit.

The main problem was that the assessment was points based, and the wording of the questions did not relate accurately to paruresis: e.g.

Section – Coping with toilet needs
Controlling your bladder – tick one box
By this we mean you lose control of your bladder before you can get to the toilet.
a) I have no problem controlling my bladder
b) I have no voluntary control of my bladder
c) I lose control of my bladder at least once a month
d) I lose control of my bladder occasionally.

As you can see it is specific to enuresis i.e. where you cannot prevent yourself from wetting yourself. My take on this is that one should tick (b). This is because of the mistaken assumption that peeing is a voluntary process; whereas we know there is an involuntary process involved as well, which shuts down under threat; this in effect leaves you without the ability to exercise the voluntary control to release and pee.

Is this of any help?

cheers

Andrew

Re: Incapacity Benefit and Paruresis

Posted by John Smith on 30/9/2009, 11:38 pm, in reply to "Re: Incapacity Benefit and Paruresis"

Hi,

Thanks for your reply.

Can I ask did the said person win the appeal? As you made reference to it's very much a box ticking process and it doesn't allow for pauresis! I doubt anyone who deals with the claims, appeals or processing knows anything about it

Re: Incapacity Benefit and Paruresis

Posted by Andrew on 2/10/2009, 12:49 am, in reply to "Re: Incapacity Benefit and Paruresis"

Hi John

Sorry, I should have said: yes he did win his appeal. He had help from the Citizen's Advice Bureau; one of their personnel represented him at the tribunal.

cheers

Andrew

Re: Incapacity Benefit and Paruresis

Posted by Mark(kent) on 9/10/2009, 8:21 am, in reply to "Incapacity Benefit and Paruresis"

Hi in response to your query I would like to add to Andrews response. Working in the Benefits Agency, I can advise that Incapacity Benefit is no longer available to new claimants. Instead you have to claim Employment & Support Allowance and the assessment and evaluation process has changed from looking at things that stop you from working to what other things can you do even with your medical condition. Thus it seems unlikely Parauresis will qualify you for any help. For more advice check out WWW.JOBCENTREPLUS.GOV.UK or DIRECT.GOV.UK for more benefit info. Hope this helps answer your question.

Mark.

Re: Incapacity Benefit and Paruresis

Posted by Andrew on 10/10/2009, 4:55 pm, in reply to "Re: Incapacity Benefit and Paruresis"

Hi Mark

Thanks for your informed advice. Very useful.

Thinking of the three severely affected men I have dealt with: they could not pee in any other than their home toilet; and even then as you can imagine, they could lock up. For them, working from home seems the only solution. One has got a job, but I cannot disclose what it is; suffice to say it means he is to all intents and purposes his own boss, and his home is in his working environment. An elegant solution which he found for himself, but not one available to most.

Could someone look at the websites Mark provided to see how it looks?

cheers

Andrew

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