Chicago – August 13, 2026
The U.S. Social Security Administration has added 14 medical conditions to its Compassionate Allowances program, allowing eligible disability claims involving those diagnoses to receive expedited review.
The additions bring the agency’s fast-track list to 314 conditions. Most of the newly included conditions are rare genetic or neurological disorders, while several are aggressive cancers. They include Aicardi syndrome, Bohring-Opitz syndrome, CASK-related gene disorders, Lafora disease, hepatosplenic T-cell lymphoma and primary cardiac sarcoma.
The Compassionate Allowances program is designed to identify disability claims involving severe conditions that clearly meet Social Security’s disability standards. The agency uses technology to flag qualifying applications and accelerate their review.
The program does not create a separate benefit or automatically guarantee payment. Applicants must still file a disability claim and provide medical evidence establishing eligibility.
The SSA said more than 1.2 million people have received accelerated decisions through the program since it began in 2008.
