The Board has decided that the Veteran's gastrointestinal issues are related to service, but needs further medical examination and opinion to determine if these conditions are directly related to his time in service or caused by any service-connected disabilities.
The deciding factor: The VA examiner found that the Veteran’s gastrointestinal issues may be due to a known clinical diagnosis with no clear etiology, and thus requires further investigation into whether they are related to service.
- Claimed conditions
- Acute calculus cholecystitis with cholecystectomy, Diverticulosis with acute diverticulitis with perforation, Resection of the large intestine, Post open cholecystectomy scar right upper quadrant and vertical midline abdomen
- How they argued it
- Not specified
- Exposure basis
- None
- Rating assigned
- None in this decision
- Decision date
- June 18, 2019
- Citation
- 19147702
Veterans Law Judge
Decisions by this judge: 3,217 · Granted: 46% (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 19147702.
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 for resection of the large intestine and ulcerative colitis with stoma and port-a-cath are being remanded due to duty-to-assist errors. The Veteran will be scheduled for VA examinations to determine the nature and etiology of his conditions.
- Granted
The Veteran's initial disability rating for colon cancer with resection of the large intestine is granted at a 20 percent level, effective from March 16, 2021.
- Partly granted
The Veteran is granted a disability evaluation of 20 percent for symptoms following resection of the large intestine from May 26, 2011 to August 18, 2022.,For the period after August 18, 2022, the Veteran's symptoms are rated at 40 percent.
- Remanded (sent back)
The Board has decided to remand the case for further examination and clarification regarding the use of clindamycin in treatment and its appropriateness given the Veteran's history, as well as whether the large intestine resection was a reasonably foreseeable outcome.
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