Combat-arms troops did far more than fight. They burned their own waste, ran the burn details, maintained vehicles, sprayed pesticides, and lived in the dust and smoke of the field for months at a time.
The examiner error is ignoring those “extra” duties. Burn-pit and field exposures are exactly where the strongest PACT Act and Gulf War pathways live for infantry — but only if the record describes them.
A rifleman’s exposure story is written in the field, not the arms room: the burn detail, the diesel generators, the pesticide-treated tents, and the constant particulate of a deployed environment.
Related duties that carry the same exposure
A single job code hides the tasks that actually put you in contact with toxins. Count every one of these you performed.
Burn-pit and waste-burning details
Vehicle and weapons maintenance in the field
Pesticide and insect-control application
Living and sleeping in blowing sand, dust, and smoke
Handling munitions and their combustion residue
What these exposures can cost you
Burn pits torched plastics, metals, medical waste, and fuel in the open air, and the smoke carried fine particulate and toxins deep into the lungs of everyone downwind. That exposure is now tied to chronic respiratory disease, rare lung conditions such as constrictive bronchiolitis, and a growing list of cancers — the very harms the PACT Act was written to cover.
For Gulf War veterans there is a second, distinct cost: chronic multisymptom illness — lasting fatigue, pain, cognitive “brain fog,” and other symptoms that can be disabling without a clean diagnosis. Both the airborne-hazard cancers and Gulf War illness can persist or worsen for decades. The strength of an infantry claim is that many of these are now presumptive — if the record shows you were there and did the details.
Watch this
VA Benefits: Toxic Exposure Update
A plain-English overview from the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs on toxic-exposure benefits and the PACT Act.
Now that you have seen what this job can cost you, here is how the exposure maps to a VA claim — and how to act on it below.
Turn this into a claim
Three questions decide almost every toxic-exposure claim. Here is how to answer them for your service — and how to get help doing it.
Do I qualify?
Almost every toxic-exposure claim comes down to three things — and you generally need all three.
A current diagnosis — a condition a doctor has actually documented, not just symptoms you live with.
An in-service exposure — proof your service put you in contact with the hazard: your MOS, the duties you performed, and your locations and dates.
A link between the two — either a PACT Act presumption that connects them for you, or a medical nexus opinion stating your service at least as likely as not caused the condition.
How to file your claim
You can start today, and filing does not require a lawyer. The path looks like this.
File an Intent to File first — it locks in your effective date and can protect up to a year of back pay while you gather evidence.
Pull your records — service treatment and personnel records, your ILER, any TERA memo, and private medical records for your diagnosis.
Submit VA Form 21-526EZ — online at VA.gov, by mail, or in person, with your evidence and a statement describing your exposure.
Prepare for the C&P exam — know your history cold, and if the exam is inadequate you can challenge it rather than accept a denial.
Want someone to do this with you?
You do not have to figure this out alone. Albert Thombs is a VA-accredited claims agent (#45147) who works the case directly with you.
Free case review — we look at your service, your diagnosis, and whether a presumption or a facts-found theory fits.
No upfront fee — on a first-time claim there is no charge to you.
Fees only if you win an appeal — any fee is capped by law and paid only from past-due benefits actually recovered, never out of pocket.
Each agent below is only compensable if the record shows the source and route. Match every one to what you actually did, where, and for how long.
Burn-pit smoke and combustion particulate
What it is: Burn pits torched plastics, metals, medical waste, and fuel in the open air, and combat-arms troops both ran the burn details and lived downwind of the pit.
Where it came from: Waste-burning details and living downwind of a pit
How it harms you: The smoke carries fine particulate and toxins deep into the lungs. It is now tied to chronic respiratory disease, rare conditions like constrictive bronchiolitis, and a growing list of cancers — and it is the core PACT Act airborne-hazard exposure. If your service matches the qualifying list, many of these become presumptive, so proximity and duration are what to document.
Why it matters: The core PACT Act airborne-hazard exposure — document proximity and duration.
Fine sand and particulate matter
What it is: The deployed environment was a constant haze of ultrafine desert sand and particulate that troops breathed while living and working in the field for months.
Where it came from: Field living in a deployed environment
How it harms you: Inhaled deep into the small airways, this fine particulate is associated with deployment-related small-airway disease that can leave you short of breath even when routine lung tests look near-normal. Note the length of the deployment, since duration is what an examiner weighs for a respiratory nexus.
Why it matters: Associated with small-airway disease; note the deployment length.
Pesticides and pyridostigmine bromide
What it is: Field insect control meant pesticides on skin, uniforms, and tents, and Gulf War troops were also issued pyridostigmine bromide (PB) pills as nerve-agent prophylaxis.
Where it came from: Insect control and Gulf War prophylaxis
How it harms you: Organophosphate pesticides and PB are cholinesterase-affecting agents linked to chronic neurologic symptoms and headache, and both are repeatedly associated with Gulf War illness. They are central to the § 3.317 presumptive pathway, so document insect-control duties and any PB issued to your unit.
Why it matters: Central to Gulf War illness pathways under § 3.317.
Fuels, exhaust, and munitions residue
What it is: Field vehicle maintenance and weapons firing surrounded infantry with fuel vapor, engine exhaust, and the combustion residue of munitions.
Where it came from: Vehicle maintenance and weapons firing
How it harms you: This layers benzene from fuels — a blood-cancer agent — onto classified diesel particulate and firing-line residue, all inhaled and absorbed in the field. It adds a chemical exposure load on top of the burn-pit and sand hazards, and the maintenance and weapons duties behind it belong in the record even though the MOS hides them.
Why it matters: Adds benzene and particulate to the field exposure load.
Oil-fire smoke (Gulf War)
What it is: The Kuwaiti oil-well fires blanketed the 1991 Gulf theater in thick, oily smoke for months, and troops on the ground breathed it continuously.
Where it came from: Kuwaiti oil-well fires
How it harms you: It is a recognized Gulf War inhalation exposure carrying combustion particulate and hydrocarbons into the lungs, feeding both respiratory disease and the chronic multisymptom pattern of Gulf War illness. Matching your unit's location and dates to the fires is what ties this exposure to your service.
Why it matters: A recognized Gulf War inhalation exposure.
The overlooked exposure
Noise & hearing
Tinnitus and hearing loss are the two most common service-connected disabilities at the VA — and the easiest to overlook, because the damage is silent and builds over years. If this job put you around jet engines, weapons, or heavy machinery, hearing belongs in your claim.
Noise level on this job
High — weapons fire, artillery, and blast overpressure, often with no chance to put in hearing protection.
Where the noise came from
Rifle, machine-gun, and crew-served weapons fireArtillery, mortars, and demolitionsBlast overpressure from IEDs, breaching, and explosionsArmored-vehicle and rotary-wing movement
What it can cause
Tinnitus — constant ringing, buzzing, or hissing
Sensorineural (permanent) hearing loss
Trouble following speech in a noisy room
Evidence that proves it
Enlistment vs. separation audiograms — compared side by side for a threshold shift
Infantry / combat-arms MOS, deployment, and combat-action records
Hearing-conservation program enrollment and annual audiograms
Buddy statements about blast events, ringing ears, and muffled hearing
Combat-arms specialties rate a high probability of hazardous noise on VA's Duty MOS Noise Exposure Listing, and impulse noise from weapons and blast is a recognized cause of both tinnitus and hearing loss. Tinnitus is established largely on your own credible report; hearing loss must be confirmed by a VA audiogram.
Symptoms to watch for
These exposures can surface as everyday complaints long before anyone connects them to service. Knowing the warning signs helps you get screened early and get them documented in your record.
Every group below has its own full page — the complete warning-sign list, the signs that should not wait, the tests to ask for by name, and the words to say on the phone.Or jump straight to how to get an appointment
These are common warning signs, not a diagnosis. Only a clinician can evaluate them — but if any sound familiar, raise them at your next visit and ask that they be noted alongside your exposure history.
Turn this page into an appointment
How to get seen about this
Reading a symptom list changes nothing on its own. A dated note in your medical record does — for your health first, and years later for a claim. Below is every route to an appointment, the phrase that gets your exposure history written down, and the numbers to dial. Nothing on this page is a diagnosis, and none of it replaces your doctor.
Some things do not wait for a scheduler
Chest pain or pressure lasting more than a few minutes, or chest pain with sweating, nausea, or pain spreading to the jaw or arm
Sudden trouble breathing, or breathlessness while sitting still
Face droop, weakness or numbness on one side, slurred speech, or sudden confusion
Coughing up or vomiting blood, or bleeding that will not stop
A first seizure, or fainting you cannot explain
Call 911 or go to the nearest emergency room. Do not wait to reach a VA facility first, and do not drive yourself. Tell VA as soon as you can afterward — VA asks to be notified within 72 hours of emergency care received in the community — and keep every discharge paper and bill.
Call your VA medical center
Fastest
Calling your own VA facility is the quickest way to get an appointment. VA Health Connect gives you round-the-clock phone access to a scheduler, a nurse, and in many regions a provider.
Do not know your facility's number? Call MyVA411 at 800-698-2411, any hour, and ask to be connected to your VA medical center's scheduling line.
Say you are an established patient if you already have a primary care provider, and ask for the next available appointment with that provider.
If nothing is available soon, ask to be added to the cancellation list and ask whether a nurse can advise in the meantime.
Call VET-HOME — VA's exposure team
Exposure-specific
833-633-8846, Monday to Friday, 9:00 a.m. to 7:30 p.m. ET. VET-HOME stands for Veterans Exposure Team — Health Outcomes Military Exposures, and it exists for exactly this conversation.
Say: I want a military environmental exposure assessment. The intake center schedules you with a clinician specially trained in military environmental exposures — by telehealth, so it does not matter how far you live from a medical center. Any veteran enrolled in VA health care, anywhere in the United States or its territories, can use it.
The clinician documents your exposure history, answers exposure-related questions, and recommends follow-up. If labs, imaging, breathing tests, or a specialty consult are needed, they say so. Afterward VA mails you a letter with your results, what they mean, and the recommendations.
Two limits, so you are not surprised: VET-HOME clinicians do not prescribe medication and do not complete disability claim forms. What they produce is a dated VA record of your exposure history — which is the piece most claims are missing.
They also handle the environmental health registry evaluations, and those do not require VA health-care enrollment. If you would rather be seen in person, ask for the environmental health coordinator at your own facility instead — the list is further down this site's Talk To Your Doctor page.
Schedule online or message your care team
Sign in on VA.gov to schedule or request many appointments yourself. What you can book online depends on your facility and the type of care.
You can also send your care team a secure message through My HealtheVet. Use it for non-urgent things — replies typically take up to three business days.
Secure messaging is not for anything urgent. If you need an answer today, call instead.
Locked out or cannot find the option? The My HealtheVet help desk is 877-327-0022.
Not enrolled in VA health care yet
Call the VA Health Benefits Hotline at 877-222-8387, Monday to Friday, 8:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m. ET, and say you want to enroll in VA health care.
Enrollment is what unlocks VA primary care and the toxic exposure screening. Under the PACT Act many veterans who were turned away years ago are now eligible, so do not assume an old answer still applies.
Enrolling does not mean giving up your own doctor. Plenty of veterans keep a civilian provider and use VA alongside it.
Enrolling in health care is separate from filing a disability claim. One does not require the other.
You see a civilian or private doctor
Ask the front desk for the next available appointment and tell them why: a symptom that has lasted weeks, plus chemical and airborne exposure during military service.
Bring this page, or write the exposures and years on one sheet of paper. Hand it over and ask for it to be scanned into your chart.
A community provider can order tests, refer you, and write your exposure history down — all of which helps. What they cannot do is VA's toxic exposure screening, which only happens inside VA's own record system.
Ask for a copy of the visit note and every result. Those copies are yours, and they are what a claim is eventually built from.
If you are in crisis right now
24/7
Dial 988 and press 1, or text 838255. The Veterans Crisis Line is staffed around the clock.
You do not need to be enrolled in VA health care, and you do not need a service-connected rating, to use it.
You can also start a confidential chat from VA's crisis line website, or ask any VA staff member to walk you to someone.
Ask for your toxic exposure screening
The PACT Act requires VA to offer this to every veteran enrolled in VA health care. It takes about five to ten minutes, and it is the cheapest way to get your exposure history into VA's own record in VA's own words.
What it is
A short set of questions asking whether you believe you were exposed to open burn pits and other airborne hazards, Agent Orange, radiation, Gulf War-related hazards, or contaminated water at Camp Lejeune.
Who can get it
Every veteran enrolled in VA health care. If you are not enrolled yet, enrollment comes first — call 877-222-8387.
How often
An initial screening, then at least once every five years. If you answer that you do not know whether you were exposed, VA schedules you again a year later.
How to get one
It is often done during a primary care or specialty visit — but you can ask for it sooner. Ask your primary care team directly, or ask your facility for its Toxic Exposure Screening Navigator by name.
What it is not
It is not an exam for any specific illness, and it is not part of the disability claims process. It is optional, and declining it does not affect your health care or your benefits.
Why bother
It creates a dated VA record that you raised military exposure. Years later, that entry is evidence that the concern predated the diagnosis.
A civilian or community provider cannot perform this screening — it lives inside VA's own health record. If you only see a private doctor, that is a reason to enroll in VA health care as well.
The burn pit registry: you are probably already in it
Since August 1, 2024, VA and the Defense Department enroll eligible veterans and service members in the Airborne Hazards and Open Burn Pit Registry automatically, from deployment records. For most people there is nothing to sign up for.
Automatic enrollment covers service between August 2, 1990 and August 31, 2021 in the listed operations and locations — Desert Shield, Desert Storm, Iraqi Freedom, Enduring Freedom and New Dawn, the Southwest Asia theater, Egypt, Afghanistan, Djibouti, Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, Uzbekistan, Yemen, and the associated airspace and waters.
You do not need to have been knowingly exposed, and you do not need any current health problem, to be included.
If you enrolled yourself before the redesign, your enrollment carried over. There is nothing to redo.
To check your status, contact the Environmental Health Coordinator at your VA facility.
The registry holds deployment and demographic data only. No medical information is stored in it.
Participation is optional and you can opt out. Being in the registry is not required to file a claim, and it does not affect your eligibility for care or benefits either way.
Being in the registry is not evidence of exposure on its own, and it is not a claim. Treat it as a research tool, and do not let anyone tell you a claim depends on it.
What to take with you
A one-page list of the chemicals and hazards you worked around, with the years and the base or ship
Your job title and MOS or rating, written the way the military wrote it
The symptoms that brought you in, and roughly when each one started
Any breathing tests, blood work, or imaging you already have, including from civilian doctors
A short list of what you want out of the visit — usually: document the exposure, order these tests, refer me
Someone who has watched the change in you, if memory or breathing is the concern
Write infantry & field operations at the top of that sheet, in the words the military used for it.
Before you leave, and afterward
Ask for a copy of the visit note before you leave, and actually read it.
Check that your exposure history is in the note. If it is missing, say so and ask for it to be added — politely, but ask.
Get a copy of every test result, including the numbers, not just the word normal.
Keep your own folder. Paper you hold is worth more than paper you assume exists somewhere.
If a symptom persists after a normal test, go back. A normal result rules out some things, not everything.
The numbers, in one place
VET-HOME — VA's exposure team
833-633-8846
Monday to Friday, 9:00 a.m. to 7:30 p.m. ET
The number to call about a military environmental exposure specifically. VET-HOME books a free telehealth evaluation with a clinician trained in military exposures, and that clinician writes your exposure history into your VA record. Say you want a military environmental exposure assessment.
MyVA411 — VA main line
800-698-2411
24 hours a day, 7 days a week
The one number to call if you do not know who to call. Ask to be put through to your VA medical center's scheduling line, or press 0 for a person.
VA Health Benefits Hotline
877-222-8387
Monday to Friday, 8:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m. ET
Enrolling in VA health care, health-care eligibility, VA medical bills, and community care billing.
Veterans Crisis Line
988, then press 1
24 hours a day, 7 days a week
Any crisis, and you do not need to be enrolled in VA health care to use it. You can also text 838255.
My HealtheVet help desk
877-327-0022
Monday to Friday
Trouble signing in, secure messaging, or online scheduling.
VA Benefits Hotline
800-827-1000
Monday to Friday, 8:00 a.m. to 9:00 p.m. ET
Claims, ratings, and back pay — the benefits side rather than the medical side.
TTY
711
Relay service
If you are deaf or hard of hearing.
These are VA's own published lines. If a number ever gives you a runaround, MyVA411 at 800-698-2411 will transfer you — it is staffed every hour of every day.
Conditions linked to these exposures
These are the diagnoses most often argued from this job. Open the evidence file for the medical studies, examiner shortcuts, and what a sound opinion must do.
None of these becomes a claim until a clinician writes it down. If a name on this list matches what you are already living with, get it evaluated and get the exposure history into the note.
Place you in the theater and near the pit — the location proof that unlocks the PACT Act presumptions for infantry.
Patrol and duty records
Show the field and detail assignments that go beyond the MOS, capturing the burn and maintenance duties the job code hides.
Buddy statements on burn details and field duties
Corroborate the off-MOS tasks that carry the exposure — often the only surviving proof that you ran the burn detail or lived beside the pit.
Airborne Hazards and Open Burn Pit Registry entry
Creates a dated VA record of the reported exposure and starts your symptom timeline on paper.
Dates and locations matching PACT qualifying service
The single most powerful item — matching your service to the qualifying list can make the condition presumptive, shifting the burden off you.
A nexus opinion where no presumption applies
For conditions outside the presumptive list, a clinician’s reasoned link to the documented field exposure keeps the claim alive on a direct basis.
The records to demand for this claim
Most exposure claims are decided on records the veteran never sees — and lost on the ones quietly missing from the file. Chase down all four below before you file, then read them yourself line by line.
The DoD–VA exposure database
Individual Longitudinal Exposure Record (ILER)
ILER is the joint DoD–VA system that compiles what the government already believes about your occupational and environmental exposures. VA raters and examiners pull it up to decide whether your job "really" exposed you — so a thin or blank ILER can quietly sink a claim before you ever see it.
How to get it: Request your own ILER report through VA / VHA — ask your VA provider or the environmental health coordinator at your VA medical center, or raise it with your representative. Get the actual report, read it line by line, and treat it as a draft, not gospel.
A missing or empty ILER entry is NOT proof you were not exposed — it means the database is incomplete, which is common. Never let an examiner treat "ILER is negative" as the end of the story; rebut it with your duty description, buddy statements, and unit records.
Toxic Exposure Risk Activity finding
TERA memorandum
A TERA memo is the VA’s formal finding that your service involved a Toxic Exposure Risk Activity. Under the PACT Act, when you have a current disability plus TERA evidence and the file is otherwise short of proof, VA is supposed to obtain a medical exam and opinion — which makes the TERA memo one of the most powerful pieces of paper in the file.
How to get it: VA is generally responsible for developing the TERA determination — but it is frequently missing from the electronic claims file, based only on your MOS, or simply wrong. Ask in writing whether a TERA memo was completed, request a copy, and if it is absent or MOS-only, submit your specific duties and locations and ask that it be corrected.
TERA conceded is NOT the same as a nexus conceded. VA can grant TERA and still deny the claim for "no link." You still need the medical opinion — but a correct TERA memo is what forces VA’s duty to get that exam in the first place.
STRs + OMPF / personnel file
Service Treatment & personnel records
Your Service Treatment Records (STRs) hold the in-service complaints, sick-call visits, and exams; your personnel file (OMPF) proves where you were and what you did. Together they anchor both the exposure and any early symptoms — and gaps in them are where claims are lost.
How to get it: Request complete copies (not summaries) through the VA claims process, the National Archives (NPRC), or milConnect. Read them page by page, list what is missing, and fill the holes with buddy statements, unit records, and your own dated timeline.
Do not assume the VA already has everything. Records are routinely incomplete or were never scanned into the electronic file. A missing sick-call entry is a hole to fill with lay evidence — not proof the symptom never happened.
What VA actually relied on
The complete electronic claims file (C-file)
The C-file is everything VA used to decide your claim — the ILER pull, any TERA memo, the exam, and every record on file. Requesting it is the only way to see exactly what evidence VA had, what it was missing, and where a denial went wrong.
How to get it: Request your C-file from VA (a Privacy Act / FOIA request, or through your representative). When it arrives, compare it against this checklist: is the ILER there, is a correct TERA memo there, are your STRs complete, and did the examiner actually address your documented exposure?
Most veterans never look at their own C-file — so they never learn the claim was decided on an incomplete record. If a document above is missing or wrong, that omission itself is often the strongest ground for a Supplemental Claim or appeal.
Test any presumption first — it is the shortest path. If none applies, the claim becomes a facts-found / direct case that needs a documented exposure and a medical nexus. Every rating and deadline below is an estimate; confirm the current status for your service.
Post-9/11 and Gulf War service brings the PACT Act burn-pit and airborne-hazard presumptions for a growing list of respiratory conditions and cancers — confirm the current list and your qualifying dates.
Gulf War undiagnosed and multisymptom illness has its own § 3.317 presumptive pathway — often the strongest route for chronic field-exposure symptoms.
Lawsuits & class actions vs. your VA claim
A VA disability claim is not a lawsuit. Some of these exposures also support a separate mass tort or trust claim against a manufacturer — a different system you can pursue at the same time. Here is how that maps to this job.
Common misconception
The "burn-pit lawsuit" misconception
Combat-arms veterans are among those most often told to "sign up for the burn-pit lawsuit." For active-duty exposure there generally is none to join: the Feres doctrine bars suing the federal government for in-service injuries, and burn-pit suits against the military have failed on that basis. The real, powerful remedy is the PACT Act of 2022, which made a long and growing list of respiratory conditions and cancers presumptive for infantry who served in qualifying locations and dates. Presumptive means you do not have to prove the exposure caused the disease — the VA concedes the link once your service matches the list. For many infantry conditions, that is a stronger position than any lawsuit could offer, and it is handled entirely through the VA system.
Rare / fact-specific
Contractor-exposure edge cases
There have been suits against private defense contractors (for example, litigation over contractor-operated burn pits), but these are narrow, hard-fought, and turn on very specific facts about who operated the hazard and your relationship to that company. They are the rare exception, not a general path for infantry, and most service members do not fit them. The dependable route is the VA claim, which for burn-pit and Gulf War exposures is often presumptive. If you believe a contractor-specific situation applies to you, verify it independently with an attorney — it does not replace, and should not delay, filing your VA claim.
You do not have to build this claim alone.
An accredited representative can order the missing records, name the legal theory that fits, and hold the VA to the evidence.
Albert Thombs · VA-accredited claims agent #45147
Who can help you file
Your VA disability claim is not a lawsuit, and there is no class action to “join.” It is an administrative claim decided by the VA — filing one does not require an attorney.
You can prepare it at no cost through a Veterans Service Organization, or with a VA-accredited claims agent who works the case directly with you. Albert Thombs is a VA-accredited claims agent (#45147).
On a first-time claim there is no fee to you. By law any fee is limited to work on an appeal of a denied or under-rated claim, is capped, and is paid only from past-due benefits actually recovered — never out of your pocket.
Build this profile into a claim the VA cannot wave off.
Bring your unit, every location, and every task above. As a VA-accredited claims agent, Albert can name the legal theory that fits, order the missing service and medical records, and build the exposure and nexus evidence into a claim the VA has to address. The case review is free.
