Social Security expands list of conditions to 314 illnesses for faster disability claims

By Jessica Hall

The ‘compassionate allowances’ list speeds consideration for benefits

More than 1.2 million people with severe disabilities have had benefits approved through an accelerated process, the Social Security Administration said.

The Social Security Administration will speed the disability approval process for more medical conditions, allowing more people with severe diseases to get benefits faster.

With the addition of 14 conditions, the agency’s “compassionate allowances” list now includes 314 conditions in total. The move will accelerate the disability application process for individuals that meet the statutory standard for disability benefits. More than 1.2 million people with severe disabilities have been approved through this accelerated disability process, the SSA said.

The newly added conditions are:

— Adenylosuccinate Lyase Deficiency – Neonatal Form and Type 1

— Aicardi Syndrome

— Baraitser-Winter Syndrome

— Beare-Stevenson Cutis Gyrata Syndrome

— Bohring-Opitz Syndrome

— CASK-Related Gene Disorders

— Hepatosplenic T-Cell Lymphoma

— Lafora Disease

— Malignant Migrating Partial Seizures of Infancy (MMPSI)

— OPHN1 Syndrome

— Primary Cardiac Sarcoma

— Primary Intracranial Malignant Melanoma

— Uveal Melanoma – with Metastases

— Warburg Micro Syndrome

“Social Security is strengthening our disability programs and making the disability determination process better, faster and higher-quality to serve the American public,” Social Security Commissioner Frank Bisignano said in a statement. “The Compassionate Allowances initiative cuts through red tape and allows us to deliver support to individuals who experience life-changing diagnoses and need help fast.”

The Social Security Administration obtains medical records to determine a person’s eligibility when they apply for disability benefits. The agency will use its technology to identify conditions from the compassionate allowances list so that it can expedite claims processing.

The move to expand the list comes as the SSA recently said it had reduced the initial disability claims backlog by over 30%, from a high of nearly 1.3 million in 2024 to 853,000 currently. The SSA also said it had cut disability-hearing wait times by more than 90 days, to 266 days – a historic low.

Critics, however, said that some of those improvements may have come at the cost of people with disabilities getting rushed through the process and losing out on benefits they are entitled to receive.

The SSA has gone through a period of upheaval in the past 18 months – including new leadership; the loss of an estimated 7,000 jobs, or 12% of its workforce; and new procedures and policies, such as new phone automation systems. Meanwhile, Social Security is facing a financial crisis and will hit insolvency in 2032, which would result in an automatic 22% benefit reduction unless Congress acts to shore up the system.

-Jessica Hall

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08-11-26 1440ET

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