MLR-13 · MILITARY LIFE RECORD
Veteran Lifetime
MLR-13: VA healthcare, disability, pension, education, employment, home loans, insurance, caregiving, debts, records corrections, and later-life benefit changes.
Controlling research question
Track each program as its own decision history: application, evidence, decision, effective date, payment, review, and later change.
Core records to preserve
Applications; supporting evidence; VA and agency decisions; notices; correspondence; treatment records; payment records; review/appeal files.
Chronology and evidence testing
- Record the event date separately from the date a document was created.
- Identify the person, component, unit, duty status, location, and issuing office where they matter.
- Separate a record’s express statement from inference, family recollection, or a later summary.
- Preserve conflicts rather than silently harmonizing them; record negative searches by repository, query, dates, and coverage.
Key evidence pathways
- Separation & DD-214 Records
- Medical & Disability Records
- Claims, Decisions & Appeals
- Photographs & Personal Papers
Related navigation guides
- VA First Year Checklist
- VA Disability Compensation
- VA Health Care Enrollment Access
- VA Decision Reviews Board Appeals
Authority and effective-date discipline
This Life Record chapter organizes chronology and evidence. It does not by itself state current eligibility, entitlement, deadline, or legal effect. For a rule-dependent question, identify the governing statute, regulation, departmental instruction, program guidance, or decision effective on the relevant date and use the linked Navigation Guide for the current pathway.
Preservation standard
Keep the best available source copy unchanged. Store edited, OCR, transcription, annotation, or working versions separately. Record creator, date/covered period, repository, exact locator, provenance, proposition supported, express limitations, and derivative lineage.
