VA Diagnostic Code 9208Delusional disorder

Delusional Disorder (VA Diagnostic Code 9208)

Delusional disorder is a mental health condition rated by the VA under § 4.130, within the Mental Disorders body system. It is evaluated using the General Rating Formula for Mental Disorders, which the VA applies across many mental health conditions.

Understanding How This Condition Is Rated

Rather than counting individual symptoms, the General Rating Formula for Mental Disorders focuses on how much your symptoms affect your occupational and social functioning. The VA looks at the overall picture — how the condition impacts your ability to work, maintain relationships, care for yourself, and function day to day — and assigns a rating level that best matches that impact.

The available rating levels are 0%, 10%, 30%, 50%, 70%, and 100%. Each level reflects an increasing degree of occupational and social impairment.

The Rating Levels

0% Rating

A mental condition has been formally diagnosed, but symptoms are not severe enough either to interfere with occupational and social functioning or to require continuous medication.

10% Rating

Occupational and social impairment due to mild or transient symptoms which decrease work efficiency and ability to perform occupational tasks only during periods of significant stress, or symptoms controlled by continuous medication.

30% Rating

Occupational and social impairment with occasional decrease in work efficiency and intermittent periods of inability to perform occupational tasks (although generally functioning satisfactorily, with routine behavior, self-care, and conversation normal). Associated symptoms may include depressed mood, anxiety, suspiciousness, panic attacks (weekly or less often), chronic sleep impairment, and mild memory loss (such as forgetting names, directions, or recent events).

50% Rating

Occupational and social impairment with reduced reliability and productivity. Associated symptoms may include flattened affect; circumstantial, circumlocutory, or stereotyped speech; panic attacks more than once a week; difficulty understanding complex commands; impairment of short- and long-term memory (such as retaining only highly learned material or forgetting to complete tasks); impaired judgment; impaired abstract thinking; disturbances of motivation and mood; and difficulty establishing and maintaining effective work and social relationships.

70% Rating

Occupational and social impairment with deficiencies in most areas, such as work, school, family relations, judgment, thinking, or mood. Associated symptoms may include suicidal ideation; obsessional rituals that interfere with routine activities; speech that is intermittently illogical, obscure, or irrelevant; near-continuous panic or depression affecting the ability to function independently, appropriately, and effectively; impaired impulse control (such as unprovoked irritability with periods of violence); spatial disorientation; neglect of personal appearance and hygiene; difficulty adapting to stressful circumstances (including work or a work-like setting); and inability to establish and maintain effective relationships.

100% Rating

Total occupational and social impairment. Associated symptoms may include gross impairment in thought processes or communication; persistent delusions or hallucinations; grossly inappropriate behavior; persistent danger of hurting oneself or others; intermittent inability to perform activities of daily living (including maintenance of minimal personal hygiene); disorientation to time or place; and memory loss for names of close relatives, one's own occupation, or one's own name.

What the VA Looks For

When evaluating delusional disorder, the VA assesses the overall level of occupational and social impairment caused by your symptoms. The symptoms listed at each level are examples that illustrate the degree of impairment — the goal is to identify the rating that most accurately reflects how the condition affects your ability to work, engage socially, and manage daily life.