Migraines at the Board

What the Board decided

The record holds 931 relevant migraine decisions: 292 granted, 190 denied, 315 remanded, 73 dismissed, and 61 mixed.

Among decisions the Board granted or denied, 292 of 482 were granted (60.6%). This merits figure counts only grants and denials. It explicitly excludes mixed, remanded, and dismissed decisions. It describes appeals the Board decided, not the chance of any one claim succeeding.

Claim types

Each decision is counted once under its recorded claim type, out of 931 relevant decisions.

Service connection accounted for 468 of 931 decisions. Increased rating accounted for 338 of 931 decisions. Other or multiple claim types accounted for 66 of 931 decisions. Effective date accounted for 51 of 931 decisions. Individual unemployability (TDIU) accounted for 8 of 931 decisions.

Secondary and direct

Of 931 relevant decisions, 229 recorded a primary condition the migraines were claimed as secondary to, and 702 recorded none. No recorded cause does not prove a claim was direct, so the second group is direct or unspecified.

Looking only at service connection claims, 216 of 468 recorded a secondary primary condition and 252 of 468 were direct or unspecified.

The rating criteria

Diagnostic Code 8100 is found at 38 C.F.R. § 4.124a. These percentages come from the regulation. They are not cohort statistics.

The word prostrating is doing most of the work in this code. It means an attack that stops you, not one you push through. How often that happens, and whether it affects your ability to hold a job, is what separates the tiers.

If you want to see how your own description reads against these criteria, the gap checker is here.

Claimed as secondary

229 of 931 relevant decisions name a primary condition the migraines were claimed as secondary to. Across the whole record, that is 229 secondary and 702 direct or unspecified, out of 931.

PTSD was named as a primary condition in 50 of 931 relevant decisions.

Most common recorded primary conditions

Each primary condition is counted once per decision. A decision naming more than one primary condition appears in more than one group, so these counts can overlap.

• Tinnitus67 of 229 secondary decisions
• PTSD50 of 229 secondary decisions
• Traumatic brain injury19 of 229 secondary decisions
• Sleep apnea16 of 229 secondary decisions
• Cervical spine or neck disability14 of 229 secondary decisions
• Allergic rhinitis9 of 229 secondary decisions

Where these exams go wrong

335 of 931 relevant decisions were remands or mixed decisions with a recorded remand defect. Of those 335, 184 were identified as involving an inadequate examination.

The themes below are keyword groupings across those 184 inadequate-exam remands. A single remand can appear under more than one theme, so the counts can overlap. They are not individual determinations about any examination.

• Toxic-exposure or Gulf War theory not addressed118 of 184 inadequate-exam remands
• Secondary causation or aggravation not addressed66 of 184 inadequate-exam remands
• Lay reports or continuity not addressed64 of 184 inadequate-exam remands
• Rationale or factual basis inadequate51 of 184 inadequate-exam remands
• Attack severity, frequency or work impact not adequately assessed43 of 184 inadequate-exam remands
• Relevant records or history not considered41 of 184 inadequate-exam remands
• Conflicting findings or opinions not reconciled16 of 184 inadequate-exam remands
• Other recorded examination defect12 of 184 inadequate-exam remands

What the Board cited

These counts are distinct decisions per evidence type, not raw citation entries. The denominators are 292 grants and 190 denials. One decision can cite more than one type. When the Board grants a claim it tends to list the evidence it relied on, while denials often say less, so the denial columns understate what was in the file.

These counts come from automated extraction of the published decisions. Errors are possible. If something here looks wrong, the contact address is in the footer.