The Veteran's gastric cancer, diagnosed many years after service, is not linked to his military service or exposure to environmental hazards.,Service connection for PTSD was granted but with a retroactive effective date of December 1, 2009.
The deciding factor: Medical evidence does not support a link between the Veteran's gastric cancer and his military service or exposure to burn pits during the Gulf War.
- Claimed conditions
- gastric cancer, gastric ulcer, chronic gastritis
- How they argued it
- Direct service connection
- Exposure basis
- Burn pits / airborne hazards
- Rating assigned
- None in this decision
- Decision date
- March 1, 2019
- Citation
- 19115486
Veterans Law Judge
Decisions by this judge: 1,836 · Granted: 31% (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 19115486.
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.
- Remanded (sent back)
The Veteran's claims for service connection of hiatal hernia and increased rating for otitis media with bilateral hearing loss are remanded due to pre-decisional duty to assist errors.
- Granted
The Veteran's cause of death, gastric cancer, is related to his exposure to contaminated water at Camp Lejeune during service. The Board granted service connection for the cause of death based on direct service connection.
- Remanded (sent back)
The Board has remanded the case due to a duty to assist error regarding the relationship between the Veteran's toxic exposure and his cause of death, gastric cancer. The VA clinician provided an inadequate opinion.
- Remanded (sent back)
The Board has determined that the VA decision on appeal is flawed due to inadequate medical opinions regarding the Veteran's claimed conditions and their relationship to his service. The claims are being remanded for further development.
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