Your Statement of Case and Other Resources

Your Statement of Case (SOC)

Once your case is registered with the Board, we assemble documentation called a Statement of Case (SOC) in preparation for your hearing. We provide the SOC to you or your representative, and to the Board Members who will hear your case.

To create your SOC, we gather information from Veterans Affairs Canada (VAC) files, Department of National Defence (DND) Service Health Records (SHRs) and/or previous hearings. This includes copies of relevant evidence and decisions that may be related to your case. A SOC may also contain generic medical information, particularly if there is no VAC Entitlement Eligibility Guideline (EEG) or VAC Medical Guideline on your disability or medical condition.

The SOC only contains case-specific evidence and information that was available when you requested your hearing. Because we prepare your SOC before your hearing, it may not include all of the information that will be relevant to your decision.

At your hearing, you or your representative may raise new issues or introduce new evidence and submissions. After the Board Members have received this information, they can then determine which issues and evidence will be relevant to your decision. For this reason, the Members may seek additional evidence or information that may be relevant and should therefore be considered part of your case. Section 15 of the VRAB Act allows Members to review any information contained in your VAC files and SHRs, while Sections 14 and 38 give Members the authority to require that additional evidence be provided to the Board. Where additional evidence is provided to the Board, it will become part of your SOC and a copy will be provided to you or your representative.

Resources used by the Veterans Review and Appeal Board

The Board must frequently examine, interpret and evaluate evidence as well as assess the credibility of the evidence presented by applicants. The following resources may be considered by the Board when deciding your case:

Interpretation decisions of the Board and its predecessors
Federal Court decisions
Table of Disabilities
Medical Guidelines
Entitlement Eligibility Guidelines
Orthopaedic Handbook (Prepared by Dr. William Stanish, May 2019) 

Merck Manual of Diagnosis and Therapy