Hemorrhoids VA rating
The VA rates hemorrhoids under DC 7336, and most ratings land in the 0–20% range. What decides yours is the criteria below and what your record actually documents.
What the criteria ask for at each level
DC 7336 - 38 CFR §4.114
| Rating | What the record has to show |
|---|---|
| 0% | Present but not meeting the 10% criteria. Service connection is granted; the payment is not. |
| 10% | Prolapsed internal hemorrhoids with two or fewer thrombosis episodes a year, or external hemorrhoids with three or more. |
| 20% | Persistent bleeding with anemia, or continuously prolapsed internal hemorrhoids with three or more thrombosis episodes a year. |
What the C&P exam actually measures
This exam is a physical examination plus an arithmetic problem, and the arithmetic is usually the part the record cannot answer.
- Whether internal hemorrhoids are prolapsed, and whether they reduce or stay prolapsed.
- How many thrombosis episodes occurred in the past year. The count, not the description, is what separates the levels.
- Whether bleeding is persistent, and whether bloodwork shows anemia alongside it.
- Whether the hemorrhoids are internal, external, or both, since the episode thresholds differ between them.
- The state on the day, which is a snapshot of a condition that flares and settles.
DC 7336 is unusual in how countable it is. Two thrombosis episodes a year and three are different ratings, so a record that describes severity without dating episodes leaves the rater without the number the code asks for.
Our C&P Prepwalks through what this exam covers, in the schedule's own terms.
Two records, read against the criteria
Two records describing similar discomfort. One of them had been counted.
| Outcome | What the record held | How the criteria read it |
|---|---|---|
| Read at 20% | Four dated clinic visits across a year, each recording a thrombosed external hemorrhoid. A complete blood count from the same period showing iron deficiency anemia, with the notes tying it to ongoing rectal bleeding. | Persistent bleeding with secondary anemia meets the 20% criteria on its own, and the four dated episodes reach the separate three-or-more route as well. |
| Read at 0% | A single note reading "history of hemorrhoids, symptomatic, treated conservatively". No dates, no episode count, no bloodwork. | Service connection can be granted on that note. The percentage cannot, because nothing in it establishes prolapse, a thrombosis count, or anemia, and 0% is what the schedule assigns when none of those are shown. |
Both veterans may have had the same year. Only one year was written down in a form the code can read. These are general illustrations of how the criteria are written, not a prediction about any particular claim - only the VA decides that, on your own record.
The schedule's own words
Ratings turn on specific terms, and a record that describes the same reality in different language often reads as a lower rating. These are the words this code measures:
- persistent bleeding
- with secondary anemia
- thrombosis episodes per year
Evidence that moves this rating
- GI/colonoscopy records documenting bleeding or anemia (bloodwork)
- Treatment records for each flare
What your statement has to cover
Doctors chart symptoms; they rarely chart consequences. That part is yours, and it is usually what separates a documented rating from a reported one.
- Count episodes per year - thrombosis (painful clotted flares) frequency drives the rating.
- Commonly secondary to service-connected IBS, chronic constipation from pain medications, or years of heavy lifting.
Our Statement Builderwalks through the questions that produce that kind of statement, in the schedule's own terms.
Where records for this condition fall short
Where hemorrhoid records commonly come up short:
- Flare-ups never dated
The difference between 10% and 20% is how many thrombosis episodes happened in a year. Notes that say "recurrent" or "frequent" describe the condition without producing the number.
- Bleeding recorded without a blood count
The 20% route pairs persistent bleeding with secondary anemia. Bleeding alone, however well documented, only reaches half of it.
- Flares managed at home and never seen
An episode treated with a sitz bath and time leaves no clinical record. A dated log kept by the veteran is evidence the VA can weigh; an untreated year is not.
- The exam day standing in for the year
A condition that flares and settles is quiet on most days. An examination that finds nothing describes one morning, and 38 CFR 4.1 asks the rating to reflect the disability over time.
Before you spend money on this claim
VA ratings do not add. Each new rating applies only to the part of you the VA still counts as unimpaired, then rounds to the nearest ten - so from 70%, a new 10% condition leaves you at exactly 70% and changes your payment by nothing.
That does not make the claim worthless; it can still matter for TDIU, for SMC, or later when something else is added. But it is worth knowing before you pay for a nexus letter rather than after. Check what one more condition does at your rating - it takes a minute.