The Veteran's claim for payment or reimbursement of unauthorized medical treatment provided at Mercy Medical Center on September 17, 2012 is denied because a VA facility was feasibly available and an attempt to use the VA facility would have been considered reasonable by a prudent layperson.
The deciding factor: A VA facility was available but the Veteran chose not to seek treatment due to a perceived one-hour wait time at the VA ER, which he believed was detrimental to his health.
- Claimed conditions
- high blood pressure
- How they argued it
- Direct service connection
- Exposure basis
- None
- Rating assigned
- None in this decision
- Decision date
- January 17, 2019
- Citation
- 19104510
Veterans Law Judge
Decisions by this judge: 1,549 · Granted: 26% (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 19104510.
What this means for you
A denial is a starting point, not the end of the road. You can see why this claim fell short — and, if you are still inside the one-year window, the appeal lanes that may remain open to you.
What you can do next
Related decisions
Other Board decisions on a similar condition or argued the same way.
- Remanded (sent back)
The Board has remanded the claims for service connection for a back disorder, high blood pressure, and type II diabetes mellitus due to errors in development of the claim.
- Denied
The Board denied service connection for a bilateral knee condition, high blood pressure, and low back condition. Service connection was also denied for pseudofolliculitis barbae.
- Granted
The Board has granted the Veteran's claim of service connection for a left knee condition. The reduction in rating for left ankle strain from 10 to zero percent was improper and restoration of the prior 10 percent rating is granted.
- Dismissed
The Veteran's attempts to appeal the January 14, 2020 rating decision were not timely filed and dismissed.
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