Q for the Canucks... Revenue Canada's Disability Tax Credit

[WestCoastCdnGrl]

How difficult is it for kids in our boat (diagnosed with OSA) to qualify for it?

Was looking on the interwebs and saw reference to it and wondered if a "moderately severe" OSA diagnosis would get me in on this?

Anyone have experience dealing with this bunch of paperwork from the fed?

Am going to see the E.N.T. guy who saved my life (by dx'ing me with OSA) for a follow up and if it's worth the effort I'll ask him (or my GP) to fill it out for me.

Thanks in advance!

[Julie]

Hi - there IS no money from the Canadian gov't. There are disability tax credits available for certain problems, but not Cpap. It is considered an "assistive device" (a direct quote from not only their website, but the Min. of Hlth to whom a letter written to local MP was forwarded) and therefore not life saving (they know better, of course).

As far as the private companies who say they can help, I investigated and discovered a couple of things, one of which is that there are a bunch of them out there who take money (about $25. a shot, but added up over a lot of people = a lot of money) ostensibly to help you navigate the gov't and get "disability" money. Well it's pretty much of a scam - there is no money for cpap related anything in the gov't and when that fact was brought to the attention of at least one of those companies they literally would hang up the phone at the beginning of a follow-up call (repeated to be sure I'd reached the right place). I don't expect the kit in the mail any time soon (as had been arranged). There's more to it, but in any case I'd stay far away from these places (who sound so helpful). They've been written about in other places (besides the forum), none of it good.

[cortez356]

Westcoast girl: When that program first came out OAS might have qualified. But when the Gov. was inudated with applications they quickly changed the parameters. Both of our children have Crohn's and applied but so far nothing. One of the qualifiers has something to do with neeeding assistance for everyday tasks. All the Drs. have a directive on how to fill out the forms and with those new regs you have to be disabled in some fashion. Even though I somerimes feel that way at night obviously I do not qualify.

Bob

[diboja]

A person has to be physically or mentally impaired to a large degree to qualify for the DTC...

Take an easy test here from the government site:
http://www.cra-arc.gc.ca/tx/ndvdls/tpcs ... 1-eng.html

Sleep Apnea does not qualify....

[WestCoastCdnGrl]

Thanks for the quick replies!

It sounded too good to be true.

Oh well... I'm just happy that Pacific Blue Cross covered the cost of my equipment (even though their replacement schedule is a little unreasonable... 2 years for masks, 5 for machines).