The United States Social Security Administration (SSA) announced this Tuesday the addition of 14 new medical conditions to its Compassionate Allowances (CAL) list.
This measure aims to significantly speed up the disability benefits application process for individuals facing severe or terminal illnesses.
SSA Commissioner Frank J. Bisignano emphasized that this initiative was designed to eliminate bureaucracy and deliver rapid support to those facing life-changing diagnoses.
With these 14 new additions, the program now covers a total of 314 medical conditions. Since the program’s creation, over 1.2 million people with severe disabilities have received their benefits through this expedited process.
The 14 new conditions added to the list
The newly added conditions include various types of rare cancers, severe genetic disorders, and neurodegenerative diseases affecting both adults and children. The list of new conditions is as follows:
- Adenylosuccinate lyase deficiency (Neonatal form and type 1)
- Aicardi syndrome
- Baraitser-Winter syndrome
- Beare-Stevenson cutis gyrata syndrome
- Bohring-Opitz syndrome
- CASK 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 metastasis)
- Warburg Micro syndrome
How does the Compassionate Allowances program work?
The Compassionate Allowances program allows the agency to automatically identify applications that clearly meet Social Security’s legal standard for disability. Instead of waiting months or years for a standard claim to be approved, patients with conditions on the CAL list can be approved almost immediately, often based solely on medical confirmation of the diagnosis.
The agency uses advanced health information technology (Health IT) to securely receive electronic medical records, enabling adjudicators to make quick decisions without requiring applicants to go through exhaustive procedures.
Anyone interested in submitting a new condition for consideration in the program can do so through the SSA’s official Compassionate Allowances webpage.
