The Board denied service connection for traumatic arthritis of the right hand and right shoulder, finding no evidence that these conditions were incurred in or aggravated by service, nor any evidence linking them to the veteran's service-connected shell fragment wounds.
The deciding factor: The VA examiners opined that the veteran's degenerative arthritis is likely due to aging and not related to his military service or shrapnel injuries.
- Claimed conditions
- Traumatic arthritis of the right hand, Traumatic arthritis of the right shoulder
- How they argued it
- Direct service connection
- Exposure basis
- None
- Rating assigned
- None in this decision
- Decision date
- April 30, 2008
- Citation
- 0814164
Veterans Law Judge
Decisions by this judge: 2,456 · Granted: 23% (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 0814164.
What this means for you
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What you can do next
Related decisions
Other Board decisions on a similar condition or argued the same way.
- Partly granted
The Board granted a 40 percent rating for L4-L5 space narrowing degenerative arthritis prior to January 14, 2025, and denied higher ratings for the other conditions.
- Granted
The Veteran's initial ratings for shoulder and elbow residuals of a right brachial plexus injury, hand and wrist residuals of a right brachial plexus injury, and traumatic arthritis of the right shoulder have been upheld. The Veteran is now rated at 70 percent for hand and wrist residuals of a right brachial plexus injury from March 15, 2016.
- Remanded (sent back)
The Board has remanded the claims for a new VA examination to determine the severity of the Veteran's right shoulder disability prior to May 30, 2014, and from May 30, 2014, to the present. The examiner must consider the Veteran’s lay statements and previous VA examinations and post-service treatment records.
- Granted
The Board has determined that the Veteran's traumatic arthritis of the right hand is attributable to an injury during service, and thus grants service connection for this condition.
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