The Board has reopened the Veteran's claim for service connection for an acquired psychiatric disability, including depressive disorder NOS. The Veteran's current depression is found to be proximately due to his service-connected disabilities of left hand and forearm atrophy, right shoulder arthritis, and cervical spine arthritis.
The deciding factor: The private medical opinion linking the Veteran's depression to his service-connected conditions outweighs the VA examiner's negative nexus opinion.
- Claimed conditions
- depressive disorder NOS, major depressive disorder, recurrent, moderate, depression, insomnia, and mild anxiety issues
- How they argued it
- Not specified
- Exposure basis
- None
- Rating assigned
- None in this decision
- Decision date
- December 1, 2016
- Citation
- 1645265
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 1645265.
What this means for you
A partial grant means some issues were granted while others were denied or remanded — common in multi-issue claims. Look at which issues went which way, and how each was argued.
What you can do next
Related decisions
Other Board decisions on a similar condition or argued the same way.
- Granted
The Board has granted the Veteran's claim for service connection for sleep apnea as secondary to his service-connected major depressive disorder, recurrent, moderate and alcohol use disorder, mild. The decision finds that there is at least an approximate balance of positive and negative evidence regarding this issue.
- Denied
The Board denied service connection for adjustment disorder with anxiety, major depressive disorder, recurrent, moderate, migraine including migraine variants, near-syncope (claimed as vasovagal syncope), thoracolumbar strain (claimed as musculoskeletal mid/lower back thoracolumbar spine), and tinnitus.
- Dismissed
The Veteran withdrew all pending claims and appeals, resulting in the dismissal of the appeal.
- Partly granted
The Board denied service connection for left ear hearing loss and denied initial ratings above the assigned levels for various service-connected conditions, except for a 50 percent rating for tension headaches.
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