The Board denied service connection for left ear and right ear hearing loss, finding that the evidence did not establish a direct link between the Veteran's in-service noise exposure and his current hearing loss.
The deciding factor: The VA examiner found no sufficient scientific basis for delayed onset hearing loss due to in-service noise exposure, given the absence of hearing loss at service separation. The private physician's opinion was considered less probative as it did not clearly state a conclusion or cite to medical literature.
- Claimed conditions
- sensorineural left ear hearing loss, sensorineural right ear hearing loss
- How they argued it
- Direct service connection
- Exposure basis
- None
- Rating assigned
- None in this decision
- Decision date
- January 8, 2019
- Citation
- 19101776
Veterans Law Judge
Decisions by this judge: 2,020 · 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 19101776.
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Related decisions
Other Board decisions on a similar condition or argued the same way.
- Remanded (sent back)
The Board has remanded the case due to inadequate medical opinions regarding whether the Veteran's pre-existing right ear hearing loss was aggravated by service. The examiner must address the significance of threshold shifts documented in STRs and determine if any increase in severity is clearly and unmistakably due to its natural progress.
- Remanded (sent back)
The Board has remanded the claims for service connection for a back disability, sensorineural left ear hearing loss, and sensorineural right ear hearing loss due to incomplete information from VA examiners.
- Granted
The Veteran's service-connected disabilities, including coronary artery disease and PTSD, render him unable to secure or follow a substantially gainful occupation. The Board finds the evidence at least evenly balanced in favor of the Veteran's claim for TDIU.
- 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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