The Board has granted service connection for DJD of the cervical spine, lumbosacral spine, right knee, left knee, and recurrent pulmonary emboli as secondary to service-connected melioidosis.
The deciding factor: The medical evidence supports a finding that these conditions are caused or aggravated by the veteran's service-connected melioidosis.
- Claimed conditions
- Degenerative Joint Disease (DJD) of the cervical spine, Degenerative Joint Disease (DJD) of the left knee, Degenerative Joint Disease (DJD) of the lumbosacral spine, Degenerative Joint Disease (DJD) of the right knee, Recurrent pulmonary emboli
- How they argued it
- Secondary to another service-connected condition
- Exposure basis
- None
- Rating assigned
- None in this decision
- Decision date
- February 18, 2004
- Citation
- 0404516
Veterans Law Judge
Decisions by this judge: 1,419 · Granted: 21% (granted or partly granted, in the vetted decisions on this site)
Judge attribution: 2025 complete; earlier years partial.
This is a plain-language summary generated by AI from a public Board of Veterans’ Appeals decision. It can contain errors — always verify against the original. Look up the original decision on VA.gov (opens in a new tab) using citation 0404516.
What this means for you
A grant means the Board agreed the veteran was entitled to the benefit. Decisions like this show the kind of evidence and arguments that tend to succeed for claims like it.
What you can do next
Related decisions
Other Board decisions on a similar condition or argued the same way.
- Dismissed
The appeal for a compensable rating for bilateral hearing loss is dismissed. The claim for a temporary total evaluation based on spinal fusion surgery of the L4-S1 vertebrae is granted. The issue of a rating in excess of 10 percent for DJD, lumbosacral spine with S/P spine fusion of L4-S1, is remanded.
- Denied
The Board denied an increased disability rating in excess of 10 percent for left knee DJD from October 1, 2008 to August 30, 2010 due to the lack of evidence showing limitation of flexion or extension that would warrant a higher rating.
- Granted
The Board granted an initial 30 percent rating for the Veteran's service-connected DJD of the left knee and left knee lateral instability, from December 15, 2009, to September 5, 2014.
- Remanded (sent back)
The Board remands the matter to obtain a new VA medical opinion regarding the severity of the left knee DJD without the ameliorative effects of medication during the limited appeal period.
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