Why are psychiatric conditions claims denied?

In a hand-tagged sample of 276 Board decisions involving psychiatric conditions, the leading reason was VA failed its duty to assist, appearing in 39.1% of them - not veteran credibility, which appears far less often.

Can tinnitus be rated higher than 10% in 2026?

The maximum schedular rating remains 10%. However, you can pursue extraschedular ratings under 38 CFR § 3.321(b)(1) for exceptional cases, or focus on secondary conditions which have no rating caps.

What's the most valuable secondary condition for tinnitus?

Depression and anxiety disorders offer the highest potential ratings (up to 100%) and are commonly caused by chronic tinnitus. Sleep disorders are also valuable, with ratings up to 50%.

Do I need an audiogram to prove tinnitus?

No. Tinnitus is considered a lay-competent condition under Charles v. Principi. Your testimony about the ringing is sufficient evidence. However, audiograms can help establish noise-induced hearing damage that supports your tinnitus claim.

Why do so many tinnitus claims get denied?

Based on our analysis of 148 cases, 42.8% are denied because service connection was not established, and 14.5% on credibility findings. Most denials stem from inadequate documentation of military noise exposure.

Can bilateral tinnitus get a higher rating than unilateral?

No. The VA rates tinnitus at 10% regardless of whether it affects one or both ears. This is why secondary conditions become critical for fair compensation reflecting the true impact of your tinnitus.

Psychiatric Conditions VA Claim Approval Rate: What the Board Actually Decided (2009–2025)

Q: What is the Psychiatric Conditions VA claim approval rate at the Board?

Across 123,858 psychiatric conditions issues decided by the Board of Veterans' Appeals in 2009–2025, 31.2% were granted, 29.4% denied and 32.5% remanded. Of the issues the Board decided on the merits, 51.5% were granted. Source: VetAid analysis of 1,340,998 published BVA decisions.

Across 123,858 psychiatric conditions issues the Board of Veterans’ Appeals decided in 2009–2025, 31.2% were granted, 29.4% denied and 32.5% remanded. From 1,340,998 published BVA decisions, updated nightly.

123,858

Psychiatric Conditions issues the Board decided, 2009–2025

Most guidance on psychiatric conditions claims explains what the regulation says. This page reports what the Board did — every psychiatric conditions issue in the 1,340,998 Board of Veterans’ Appeals decisions VetAid has parsed from the published record, counted at the issue level the way the Board itself reports.

What would this rating pay you? (2026 rates)

Official 2026 VA monthly compensation, including the 2.8% COLA increase.

Rating Married Children

per month · per year, tax-free

Dependent add-ons start at a 30% rating. Child-only and dependent-parent rates: see the full 2026 pay chart.

2026 base rates, all ratings (veteran alone)

Rating	Monthly (2026, incl. 2.8% COLA)
10%	$180.42
20%	$356.66
30%	$552.47
40%	$795.84
50%	$1,132.90
60%	$1,435.02
70%	$1,808.45
80%	$2,102.15
90%	$2,362.30
100%	$3,938.58

See your full claim picture — free

Outcomes, 2009–2025

Disposition	Issues	Share
Granted	38,587	31.2%
Denied	36,382	29.4%
Remanded — sent back rather than decided	40,279	32.5%
Dismissed	7,688	6.2%
Withdrawn, vacated, moot, referred	922	0.7%

Of the issues the Board decided on the merits — granted or denied, leaving remands aside — 51.5% were granted. See the live Psychiatric Conditions decision list.

By year

Only years the crawl has fully exhausted are shown; the current year and any year still downloading are left out so a partial year cannot pose as a trend.

Year	Issues	Granted	Denied	Remanded
2009	2,718	33.0%	58.9%	4.5%
2010	2,891	40.0%	51.5%	4.4%
2011	2,793	43.9%	47.2%	4.9%
2012	2,743	45.2%	45.7%	4.5%
2013	2,615	39.9%	48.9%	5.1%
2014	3,484	43.8%	45.6%	5.4%
2015	3,538	46.4%	41.8%	6.0%
2016	3,403	48.6%	40.0%	4.8%
2017	4,565	43.1%	47.4%	4.3%
2018	9,280	32.4%	23.3%	37.7%
2019	12,860	25.2%	23.1%	46.9%
2020	11,511	24.6%	25.4%	44.5%
2021	9,952	25.7%	24.3%	42.9%
2022	10,095	26.6%	20.2%	45.9%
2023	12,343	25.9%	21.2%	44.5%
2024	13,734	29.4%	24.0%	36.8%
2025	15,333	30.5%	28.8%	31.2%

Why these claims actually fail

The full corpus records what the Board decided, not why. For the why, VetAid hand-tagged a smaller sample: 276 Board decisions involving psychiatric conditions. A decision may carry more than one reason, so shares can exceed 100%.

Reason stated in the decision	Decisions	Share of 276
VA failed its duty to assist	108	39.1%
no medical nexus	66	23.9%
evidence not new and material	30	10.9%
lay evidence held not competent	12	4.3%
credibility findings	9	3.3%

Note what leads: VA failed its duty to assist, in 39.1% of the tagged decisions. Most published advice tells veterans to shore up their own credibility. In this record credibility findings sit near the bottom — the far more common failure is procedural, and it is VA’ burden, not the veteran’.

Authorities the Board relied on (tagged sample)

Shedden v. Principi — cited in 94 decisions
Lynch v. Mc — cited in 92 decisions
Rodriguez v. Peake — cited in 72 decisions
Jandreau v. Nicholson — cited in 64 decisions
Gilbert v. Derwinski — cited in 51 decisions

Regulations most often applied (tagged sample)

38 CFR 20.1303 — 276 decisions
38 CFR 3.102 — 180 decisions
38 USC 1110 — 137 decisions
38 USC 1155 — 116 decisions
38 CFR 3.303 — 90 decisions
38 CFR 4.1 — 83 decisions

Want to know which of these patterns your own claim matches? VetAid checks your claim against this decision record. Free, and we never take a cut of your back pay.

See what my psychiatric conditions claim is missing

Method and provenance

Outcomes: 123,858 issues involving psychiatric conditions in 111,773 decisions, drawn from 1,340,998 public Board of Veterans’ Appeals decisions (2007-06-01 to 2026-04-30) at va.gov/vetapp, parsed at the issue level. The headline rates use complete years only (2009–2025); the corpus also holds 129,529 such issues across all years downloaded so far. Decisions the parser could not read cleanly (82,386) are excluded from the rates. This page is regenerated automatically each night by data_moat/gen_outcome_pages.py as the crawl grows. Board-wide rates by condition and judge: /bva/outcomes.

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