The Board found that the veteran's current low back disorder was not incurred in or aggravated by active service and denied his claim for service connection.
The deciding factor: The VA examiner concluded that the veteran's current low back condition is more likely related to a post-service incident while working as a letter carrier, rather than an in-service muscle strain diagnosis.
- Claimed conditions
- degenerative disc disease at L5/S1, status post laminectomies at L5/S1
- How they argued it
- Direct service connection
- Exposure basis
- None
- Rating assigned
- None in this decision
- Decision date
- June 26, 2006
- Citation
- 0618780
Veterans Law Judge
Decisions by this judge: 2,645 · Granted: 19% (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 0618780.
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Related decisions
Other Board decisions on a similar condition or argued the same way.
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The Board has granted service connection for the Veteran's low back disability with bilateral lower extremity radiculopathy, finding that it is at least as likely as not related to his active service.
- Denied
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- Denied
The Board denied the veteran's claim for a disability evaluation in excess of 20 percent for his lumbar strain, finding that the current manifestations do not warrant such an increase.
- Denied
The Board denied the veteran's claims for increased ratings for his service-connected lumbar myositis, psychoneurosis and conversion hysteria, residuals of shrapnel wounds of the left thigh and pelvis with retained foreign bodies and scars, and residuals of shell fragment wounds of the right thigh and left leg. The veteran was also denied entitlement to a total disability rating based on individual unemployability due to service-connected disabilities.
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