VA Increases Rates For Disability Compensation

Effective December 1, 2018, as required by the Veterans’ Compensation Cost-of-Living Adjustment Act of 2018, the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA), adjusted certain benefit rates, that affect the compensation program.

VA is required to increase these benefit rates by the same percentage as increases in the benefit amounts payable under title II of the Social Security Act. The Social Security Administration has announced that there will be a 2.8 percent cost-of-living increase in Social Security benefits for 2019. Therefore, applying the same percentage, the rates for VA’s compensation program, that became effective on December 1, 2018, are found at:

 

https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/FR-2019-03-20/pdf/2019-05287.pdf

 

New Access to VA Hospital and Outpatient Care for Medal of Honor Veterans

Today, VA published in the Federal Register, a new final rule that increased access to VA Hospital and Outpatient Care for Medal of Honor Veterans.  VA stated,

“The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) is amending its medical regulations governing eligibility for VA health care and copayment requirements to conform to recent statutory changes. VA is changing its enrollment criteria to move Medal of Honor recipients from priority category three to priority category one, and exempting recipients of the Medal of Honor from copayments for inpatient care, outpatient care, medications, and extended care services.

DATES: This final rule is effective on March 5, 2019.”

VA Withdraws Regulation that Changed Schedule for Rating Disabilities – The Genitourinary Diseases and Conditions

In Today’s Federal Register, The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) published that it ,”is withdrawing a document published in the Federal Register on July 28, 2017, proposing to amend the portion of its Schedule for Rating Disabilities that addresses the genitourinary system.”  VA stated,

“On July 28, 2017, VA published in the Federal Register the proposed rule for Schedule for Rating Disabilities; The Genitourinary Diseases and Conditions. See 82 FR 35140. During the internal review process of the final rule, VA found that an erroneous value and unit of measure were inadvertently included in the albumin/creatinine ratio (ACR) in the renal dysfunction rating criteria under proposed 38 CFR 4.115a. The erroneous proposed value would have resulted in erroneous disability evaluations for multiple renal disabilities. Accordingly, VA is withdrawing the proposal and is developing a new proposal, to include correct ACR values, which VA intends to publish at a later date.”