Can You Get Disability for Fibromyalgia?

Fibromyalgia is a chronic pain disorder that causes intense suffering and pain. Its continual daily presence leaves many sufferers to be totally disabled either from the pain itself or from the mental and emotional depression that so often afflicts those with this condition. Unfortunately, because the illness is difficult to “prove,” Fibromyalgia (FM) is not included as a “listed” disability in the Social Security Disability Blue Book.

The Important Message is this: You Can Get Disability for Fibromyalgia

However, winning approval of SSD benefits in a claim based solely on Fibromyalgia is quite challenging. That challenge can be overcome in some cases where the medical records show a long-term history of treatment, a consistent reported experience, a demonstrated inability to work, and accompanying mental disorders related to extended periods of tolerating intense pain, like severe depression.

All of us at The Keener Law Firm believe everyone whose physical or mental disability prevents them from earning enough income to support themselves needs an experienced and aggressive legal advocate to fight for the Social Security Disability benefits they deserve. In cases of Fibromyalgia, too many lawyers claim to be disability lawyers but they won’t fight for a client with Fibromyalgia. The disability lawyers and advocates at The Keener Law Firm recognizes that Fibromyalgia cases are a little harder to get approved, but that’s the challenge.

If you have Fibromyalgia and you want to apply for Social Security Disability benefits, contact the Keener Law Firm by calling 1-770-955-3000 or Toll Free: 800-900-2400 or visit keenerlaw.com.  

How to Win Social Security Disability Benefits with Fibromyalgia

The origin of Fibromyalgia has been a mystery to the medical profession for many years. The existence and severity of the disorder are not in doubt, nor is the misery in which so many people live. But because Fibromyalgia can’t be seen in an MRI or CT scan, and no blood test results demonstrate the presence of Fibromyalgia, the Social Security Administration (SSA) has been cautious in accepting Fibromyalgia as a basis on which to approve disability benefits.

How Social Security Defines “Disability”

In the rules and regulations on which Social Security Disability operates, a disability is defined as a “medically determinable physical or mental impairment that lasts or is expected to last for 12 months (or result in death) and which prevents the person from performing substantial gainful activities.”

It’s important to remember that the SSA only recognizes total, long-term, or permanent disability. It doesn’t administer any programs for short-term or temporary disability.

In 2024, to prove a case of Fibromyalgia as a basis for a valid Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI)  claim, the applicant’s condition must be severe enough to keep them from performing enough work to earn $1,550 per month for at least 12 months. While in no way discounting the extent of suffering that Fibromyalgia patients live with, many people with the disorder continue to work, some with special accommodations by their employers.

Winning Social Security Disability benefits for Fibromyalgia requires persuasive medical evidence and credible reports of symptoms showing the claimant can’t earn $1,550 due to their impairment(s).

Medical Records and Treatment History

Because of some people’s unjustified bias, proving a genuine case of disabling Fibromyalgia requires the applicant to be able to present medical records of long-term, consistent, and repeated complaints of the classic Fibromyalgia symptoms. Those could include the following:

• Pain and multiple points of tenderness (tender points) throughout the body,
• Fatigue,
• Sleep disturbances (not refreshed following substantial sleep periods)
• Difficulty maintaining concentration (Fibro-fog),
• Feeling numbness, tingling, or pins-and-needles in arms, hands, legs, and feet,
• Irritable bowel syndrome,
• Difficulty or pain urinating,
• Painful menstrual cramping,
• Mood disorders (anxiety, depression),
• Stiffness upon waking up.

Persistently reporting and seeking treatment over a sustained period reflects a genuine illness and the continual presence of discomfort. But part of a successful campaign to win SSD benefits with Fibromyalgia is the elimination of other possible causes.

Most illnesses and disorders can be detected, identified, and diagnosed by performing blood panels, lab tests, x-rays, MRIs and other diagnostic testing. Fibromyalgia patients wish they could demonstrate the genuineness of their diagnoses to win recognition more easily as disabled. But the elimination of other possible sources of the claimant’s pain and other symptoms is supportive evidence that Fibromyalgia is present, and that your physical and mental impairments are disabling.

You Could Win Social Security Disability Benefits Based on Other Symptoms?

Since the medical debate rages on whether Fibromyalgia is or is not an autoimmune disease, it may be productive to concentrate on the subsidiary impairments for SSD benefits. After living with the torment of Fibromyalgia, patients often develop serious persistent mental illness, major depressive disorder, generalized anxiety disorder, post-traumatic stress disorder, and others. Any one or a combination of these mental impairments diagnosed by the appropriate authoritative medical experts could be enough  to support a Social Security Disability claim if properly documented. The mental impairment needs to be cited as part of the claim when the benefit application is first submitted; it cannot be added later as an alternative.

Mental impairments in combination with medically recorded physical symptoms often serve as qualifying disabilities in Social Security Disability cases.