Can you get Social Security disability for Meniere's Disease?

Meniere’s disease is an inner ear disorder that can make holding a job impossible and has a substantial effect on daily life. I have represented Indiana claimants with Meniere’s and understand how difficult the condition makes ordinary activities.

If you have Meniere’s disease and cannot work because of it, it may be time to file for Social Security Disability Insurance or Supplemental Security Income.

Symptoms of Meniere’s disease

Symptoms vary between people, and Social Security describes the condition as involving paroxysmal attacks of vertigo, tinnitus, and fluctuating hearing loss.

• Episodes of dizziness and vertigo. These attacks can bring nausea and vomiting and raise the risk of falls. Their intensity and duration vary considerably from person to person, and an attack can last from twenty minutes to several hours.
• Tinnitus, meaning ringing in the ears. Ringing is a common complaint generally, but people with Meniere’s often describe other distracting sounds as well, and concentrating on work while experiencing them can be seriously difficult.
• Hearing loss, which fluctuates early on and tends to become permanent over time.
• Aural fullness, a sensation of pressure in the affected ear.

There is one feature Social Security itself emphasizes that matters for a claim. Remissions in Meniere’s disease are unpredictable and irregular, and may be long-lasting, so the agency says the severity of the impairment is best determined after prolonged observation and repeated examinations.

That has a practical consequence. A single examination during a good period says very little about your condition, and a claim built on one snapshot understates it. A longitudinal record is what this condition needs.

How Social Security evaluates Meniere’s disease

Social Security addresses the condition in its Listing of Impairments at listing 2.07, disturbance of labyrinthine-vestibular function, which names Meniere’s disease specifically.

The listing has a characterization and two required elements.

Characterized by a history of frequent attacks of balance disturbance, tinnitus, and progressive loss of hearing.

With both A and B:

• A. Disturbed function of the vestibular labyrinth, demonstrated by caloric or other vestibular tests
• B. Hearing loss established by audiometry

As with any claim, the condition also has to have lasted, or be expected to last, at least twelve months. Long remissions do not end a claim, but they are part of what Social Security looks at over time, which is another reason the record needs to cover a period rather than a moment.

The testing gap

This is the most useful thing on this page, and it costs people claims.

Both A and B are required, and both are specific test results rather than clinical impressions. A great many Meniere’s files contain a confident diagnosis, a clear history of vertigo attacks, and neither test.

That is not a failure of care. Meniere’s is often diagnosed clinically from the pattern of symptoms, and a treating physician managing your condition may have no particular reason to order caloric testing. Audiometry is more common but is not universal either, and where it has been done it may not be in the records Social Security receives.

Social Security’s guidance is specific about what it expects. Diagnosis of a vestibular disorder requires a comprehensive neuro-otolaryngologic examination with a detailed description of the vertiginous episodes, including the frequency, severity, and duration of the attacks. Pure tone and speech audiometry, with the appropriate special examinations such as Bekesy audiometry, are necessary, and vestibular function is assessed by positional and caloric testing, preferably by electronystagmography.

What to do about it. If your file does not contain vestibular testing and audiometry, ask your ENT or neurologist whether they can be arranged. This is a straightforward request, the tests are routine, and their absence is the single most common reason a Meniere’s claim fails at the listing step when it would otherwise have succeeded.

It is also worth checking whether testing was done years ago and simply has not been collected. Older results are worth having, and they are often most useful alongside current testing rather than instead of it, since a comparison over time is what demonstrates the progressive hearing loss the listing asks for.

The progressive hearing loss requirement

One further point: The listing asks for progressive loss of hearing, and the fluctuating hearing loss typical of early Meniere’s may not read that way in a file that only covers a short period.

This is another reason a longitudinal record matters. Audiometry from several points over time showing deterioration is considerably more persuasive than a single test, and it speaks directly to the word “progressive.”

Getting a physician’s help with the listing

I often prepare questionnaires and send them to a claimant’s physicians in the hope that their answers will support the claim. For Meniere’s the questionnaire should track the elements of the listing directly: the frequency and duration of attacks, the tinnitus, the hearing loss and whether it is progressing, and whether vestibular testing and audiometry have been performed and what they showed.

If you do not meet the listing

If you cannot work because of this condition, do not give up. In my experience you may be found disabled at a hearing simply because the condition prevents you from performing substantial gainful activity.

Meniere’s disease limits work in ways that are specific to it, and they are worth documenting deliberately.

Unpredictability. This is the central argument. An attack can begin without warning and last hours, and no employer can accommodate a worker who may become incapacitated at any point in a shift. Vocational experts routinely testify that more than about two absences a month will not be tolerated, and the same applies to a worker who has to leave partway through a day.

Recovery time. Many people are exhausted and unsteady for a day or more after an attack, which extends the effect well beyond the episode itself.

Safety restrictions. Sudden vertigo makes working at heights, on ladders or scaffolding, around machinery, and driving genuinely dangerous. These restrictions eliminate whole categories of work, and they are concrete enough that a judge can act on them.

Concentration. Persistent tinnitus and distracting sounds interfere with sustained attention, and this is easy to leave out of a file because it produces no examination finding.

Falls. Balance disturbance carries a real risk, and any falls should be recorded.

Medication effects. Vestibular suppressants and antiemetics commonly cause drowsiness, which is a limitation in its own right.

Nausea and vomiting, which frequently accompany attacks and are disabling on their own during an episode.

A diary recording the date, duration, and after-effects of each attack over several months is one of the more useful things you can produce, because everything here turns on frequency and unpredictability rather than on a finding at a single appointment.

Your age, education, and work history matter at this stage too. A claimant of 50 or older with no transferable skills is in a considerably stronger position than a younger claimant with identical limitations, and at 55 the vocational rules shift again in the claimant’s favor. Since June 22, 2024, Social Security also looks only at work performed in the previous five years rather than fifteen.

Your other conditions count too

Social Security must consider all of your impairments in combination. Where hearing loss is significant, it may also be relevant under the hearing loss listings. Anxiety and depression are common alongside a condition this unpredictable, and both are properly part of the claim.

Talk with an Indiana disability attorney

If Meniere’s disease is keeping you from working, contact my office for a free consultation.

Two things are worth checking early in a Meniere’s claim. Whether vestibular testing and audiometry are actually in your file, since the listing needs both and a great many files have neither. And whether anyone has recorded the pattern of your attacks over time, because this is a condition that a single good day can make look manageable.

I represent Indiana residents at every stage, from the initial application through a hearing before an Administrative Law Judge.