Mental-health diagnoses are rarely as clean as the VA’s forms suggest. PTSD, depression, anxiety, and insomnia overlap with each other — and with the physical injuries many veterans bring home from service. A symptom that looks like one thing on a brief exam often turns out to be something else entirely, or two things at once.
The pages below cover the conditions I most often evaluate: what they look like clinically, how the VA rates them, and the diagnostic distinctions that can decide whether a claim succeeds or stalls. If you’re not sure which one fits your situation, start with the page closest to your symptoms — most veterans I see have more than one of these running together.