840 CMR, § 10.23
In the event that an employee of PERAC files an application for termination retirement, accidental disability retirement, or ordinary disability retirement the State Retirement Board shall follow the following procedures for processing said application.
Medical Panels for Disability. The State Board of Retirement (SBR) should process the disability application and determine whether or not to request a medical panel. The medical panel request should not be forwarded to PERAC. The SBR should request that the Department of Industrial Accidents or the Human Resources Division assemble the Panel from a list of doctors contained in PERAC's vendor list. The completed Medical Panel Reports should be sent directly to the SBR and not to PERAC. PERAC will be entitled to see the Medical Panel Reports only to the extent that it requests to do so in its role as the Employer. The Medical Panel Doctors shall be notified by the SBR not to involve PERAC in this process. If clarification is needed it should be requested directly by the SBR. If a new panel is necessary the same process should be followed.
Disability Review Process. In PERAC's own Section 21(1)(d) review process, two attorneys must approve each application. PERAC will agree to cede its Section 21(1)(d) review authority to two attorneys chosen by the SBR. The two attorneys should not be employees of the State Treasurer but should be attorneys familiar with the retirement system. The Executive Director of PERAC will write a letter ceding PERAC's authority for review to the two attorneys selected by the SBR.
Records. PERAC is required to maintain a database of all disability retirees in the Commonwealth, to process overearnings statements and to conduct Comprehensive Medical Evaluations (CMEs). If a retirement is granted, PERAC shall, as soon as the benefit has been finally approved, be provided a paper copy of the PERAC employee's case file from the SBR for 91A and CME purposes. The member's disability file shall not be stored electronically, except that limited information, sufficient to permit the tracking of 91A matters and the scheduling of future CMEs, shall be added to the database.
In the event a retirement allowance is not granted, PERAC shall be provided a paper copy of the file from the SBR in order to fulfill its duty to maintain records of all disability applicants in the Commonwealth.
The PERAC employee's file shall be maintained only in paper form until 25 years have passed or until the death of the PERAC employee, whichever event shall first occur. Any documentation generated by PERAC as a result of the 91A or CME process will also be maintained in paper form. Upon the passage of 25 years from the date of receipt of the documents or the death of the PERAC employee, whichever event shall first occur, the employee's file, and all subsequent documents generated shall be put into the PERAC database.
840 CMR, § 10.23