Article 31. Recognition of a citizen as a person with a disability

The recognition of a citizen as a person with a disability shall be performed by medico-social expert commissions, and for children under the age of eighteen – by pediatric medico-social expert commissions.

A person shall be referred for a medico-social expert examination by a state medical institution, with the exception of the cases stipulated by part 3 of this Article.

Medical organizations – regardless of their organizational and legal status – shall have the right to refer for medico-social expert examination the persons with obvious signs of disability, without performing additional examinations to obtain clinical and functional data.

If a person, due to their health condition, is unable to visit the medical-social expert commission and this is confirmed by the conclusion of a medical institution, the medical-social expertise shall be conducted at the person's home or in the inpatient facility where the person is undergoing treatment, at the person's request.

Representatives of local employment agencies, local government bodies, trade unions, insurance and other organizations, as well as representatives of public associations of people with disabilities shall be entitled to take part in meetings of the medico-social expert commission.

Certification shall be performed no later than ten calendar days from the date medico-social expert commissions accept medical documents. The person referred to undergo a medico-social expert examination shall be notified of the day of the examination by the medico-social expert commission within two working days from the day medical documents are accepted. When a disability is established, a citizen shall be recognized a person with a disability from the date on which the documents are accepted by medico-social expert commissions.

Based on the results of the medico-social expert examination, a citizen, recognized as a person with a disability shall be determined the group, cause, and time period for establishing a disability, and children under the age of eighteen – the category "Children with Disabilities" with a time period for re-examination.

Disability without a re-examination period shall be established for persistent, irreversible morphological changes and disorders of the functions of human organs and systems, the impossibility of improving the course of illness and recovery and social adaptation due to the ineffectiveness of rehabilitation measures taken, in accordance with the list of diseases and anatomical defects, approved in line with the established procedure.