What is the VA rating for Peripheral Nerves, Lower Extremity?

All 27 codes in this hub reduce to just 9 underlying tables -- one per nerve. Paralysis (DC 8521-8530) uses the full table (mild through complete). Neuritis (DC 8621-8630) and neuralgia (DC 8721-8730) reuse the EXACT SAME table for that nerve, just capped at a lower ceiling.

• Neuritis caps at severe incomplete paralysis (if 'organic changes' are documented present) or moderate incomplete (if not) -- complete paralysis is never reachable via neuritis.
• Neuralgia caps at moderate incomplete paralysis always -- severe and complete are never reachable via neuralgia.
• This means, for example, DC 8621 (common peroneal nerve neuritis) and DC 8721 (common peroneal nerve neuralgia) both reuse DC 8521's own percentage numbers -- they are not separate scales with their own numbers.
• This architecture is identical to the Peripheral Nerves, Upper Extremity hub's own shared-table design, minus that hub's Major/Minor axis.

Records to review: Peripheral Nerves DBQ; Neurological examination records documenting the specific nerve, severity, and category.

This hub deliberately does NOT cover DC 8520 (sciatic) or DC 8526 (femoral) -- both are already live and confirmed-accurate on this site's separate Radiculopathy hub, reviewed and re-confirmed in this same work session.

• Radiculopathy's sciatic-nerve figures: complete paralysis 80 percent, severe incomplete paralysis with marked muscular atrophy 60 percent, moderately severe incomplete paralysis 40 percent, moderate incomplete paralysis 20 percent, mild incomplete paralysis 10 percent (a 5-tier structure, distinct from this hub's 4-tier structure).
• Radiculopathy's femoral-nerve figures: complete paralysis 40 percent, severe incomplete paralysis 30 percent, moderate incomplete paralysis 20 percent, mild incomplete paralysis 10 percent (a 4-tier structure matching this hub's own external/internal popliteal figures).
• These two hubs together cover 11 of the DC 8520-8530 family's nerves with zero overlap -- this hub owns 9 (DC 8521-8525, 8527-8530), Radiculopathy owns 2 (DC 8520, 8526).
• If your records describe sciatic or femoral nerve involvement, use the Radiculopathy hub instead of this one.

Records to review: This site's Radiculopathy hub.

38 CFR 4.123's neuritis cap depends entirely on whether 'organic changes' are present -- but the regulation never defines this term anywhere in its own text.

• This ambiguity has two layers: what 'organic changes' means at all (commonly read as loss of reflexes and muscle atrophy, but not defined as such in the text), and whether 'not characterized by organic changes' requires the complete absence of ALL such changes or just any one.
• RatingScope discloses this as a genuinely open interpretive question -- it does not guess a definition or default to either the severe or moderate cap when organic-changes status is undocumented.
• This is the same disclosure already made on the Peripheral Nerves, Upper Extremity hub -- the ambiguity is a feature of 38 CFR 4.123 itself, not specific to any one nerve or extremity.

Records to review: Neurological examination records documenting reflexes, muscle atrophy, and other objective findings.

The posterior tibial nerve's mild and moderate incomplete paralysis tiers are both rated at 10 percent -- a real, verbatim-confirmed feature of the regulation's own published table, not an error.

• Confirmed via fresh verbatim fetch: DC 8525's table lists 'Mild -- 10' and 'Moderate -- 10' as two distinct rows with the identical value, followed by 'Severe -- 20' and the complete-paralysis description at 30 percent.
• This hub still produces two distinct criterion IDs (one for mild, one for moderate) so each remains independently traceable, even though their rating percentages are identical.
• This is not corrected or 'fixed' to create an artificial distinction -- the tie is modeled exactly as the regulation reads.

Records to review: Peripheral Nerves DBQ; Neurological examination records documenting posterior tibial nerve severity.

The internal saphenous, obturator, external cutaneous nerve of thigh, and ilio-inguinal nerves each support only 2 real rating outcomes under current CFR text -- yet VA's own DBQ offers a 4-level checkbox (Complete/Severe/Moderate/Mild) for these same nerves.

• The regulation's own table for each of these 4 nerves lists only 2 rows: 'Mild or moderate -- 0' and 'Severe to complete -- 10' (internal saphenous's own header differs slightly in wording but is the same 2-row structure).
• This hub's intake question still asks for one of the 4 named severities for these nerves, matching the DBQ's own checkbox structure, so that documented DBQ language maps directly without forcing a veteran or preparer to guess which of the DBQ's 4 checkboxes corresponds to which of the regulation's 2 real rows.
• Both a 'mild' and a 'moderate' answer for these 4 nerves resolve to the identical 0 percent outcome; both a 'severe' and a 'complete' answer resolve to the identical 10 percent outcome -- disclosed here explicitly rather than silently collapsing the question to only 2 options.

Records to review: Peripheral Nerves DBQ (4-level checkbox for these nerves); Neurological examination records documenting the specific nerve and severity.

A Note appearing in this same regulatory table states: "Combined nerve injuries should be rated by reference to the major involvement, or if sufficient in extent, consider radicular group ratings." Whether this Note applies only to the upper-extremity portion of the table or to this entire schedule (including the lower-extremity nerves in this hub) is genuinely unclear from the regulation's plain text.

• This ambiguity was identified during this hub's own research pass and is disclosed here as a genuinely open question, not resolved by picking an interpretation.
• One real structural fact worth weighing: "radicular group" ratings (DC 8510 upper, 8511 middle, 8512 lower, 8513 all radicular groups) are exclusively an upper-extremity concept -- there is no lower-extremity radicular-group equivalent anywhere in this schedule. The Note also sits as the final line of the upper-extremity table, immediately before the Sciatic nerve table (this hub's own scope) begins. Neither of these facts definitively resolves the scope question, since the regulation's own text does not expressly limit the Note to the upper-extremity table, but both point toward the Note's second option (radicular group ratings) having no literal application to this hub's nerves even if the Note itself applies here.
• RatingScope does not auto-apply this Note's major-involvement or radicular-group logic to any documented combination of nerve findings in this hub -- if your records describe injury to more than one nerve, review this Note's applicability directly against the regulation's current text or with an accredited representative.

Records to review: 38 CFR 4.124a's own table-wide Notes.

38 CFR 4.68 states that a combined rating for disabilities of one extremity shall not exceed the rating for amputation at the elective level, were amputation to be performed -- confirmed via primary source. This can apply whenever more than one ratable condition affects the same leg, including this hub's own nerve ratings.

• This is a ceiling on the COMBINED total for a single extremity, not a rule about any one diagnostic code alone -- it only matters when a veteran has more than one ratable condition in the same leg.
• For example, if a documented lower-extremity nerve finding from this hub is combined with a separate knee, ankle, or other lower-extremity rating for the same leg, the combined total cannot exceed what the amputation rating would be at the applicable elective level.
• RatingScope discloses this rule; it does not itself determine the applicable elective amputation level or compute the combined-rating ceiling.

Records to review: Records documenting all ratable conditions affecting the same leg.