The Board has remanded the case for further development, including obtaining VA treatment records and providing a spine examination. The Veteran's claims of service connection for bilateral knee disability and TDIU are also being remanded.
The deciding factor: The appeal is being remanded to allow for additional evidence collection and medical evaluation related to the Veteran's spinal conditions and bilateral knee disability.
- Claimed conditions
- chronic low back pain with degenerative changes, chronic neck pain with degenerative changes
- How they argued it
- Direct service connection
- Exposure basis
- None
- Rating assigned
- None in this decision
- Decision date
- May 22, 2013
- Citation
- 1316767
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 1316767.
What this means for you
A remand is not a loss. The Board sent the case back for more development — often a new exam or missing records — before making a final decision. Many remands later end in a grant, and the decision spells out exactly what the Board wanted to see.
What you can do next
Related decisions
Other Board decisions on a similar condition or argued the same way.
- Denied
The Board denied the Veteran's claims for service connection for left knee arthritis, right knee arthritis, chronic low back pain with degenerative changes, left calcaneal osteophytosis, and right calcaneal osteophytosis. The appeals were also denied for increased ratings in excess of 20 percent for chronic low back pain with degenerative changes and in excess of 10 percent for left and right calcaneal osteophytosis.
- Remanded (sent back)
The Veteran is granted TDIU, but the effective date for service connection of left lower extremity radiculopathy remains April 20, 2009.,The Board has found that a disability rating in excess of 40 percent for chronic low back pain with degenerative changes and service connection for bilateral upper extremity disability secondary to service-connected low back pain are both remanded.
- Granted
The Veteran's appeal for increased ratings for bilateral hearing loss and chronic low back pain with degenerative changes is dismissed. The Board finds that the Veteran's service-connected disabilities render him unable to secure or follow substantially gainful employment, thus granting a total disability rating based on individual unemployability (TDIU).
- Granted
The veteran's service-connected conditions (chronic low back pain and major depression) require dental care, but the VAMC in San Francisco is not geographically accessible. The Board has determined that the veteran should receive non-VA fee basis dental care due to the aggravation of her service-connected conditions from travel.
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