The Board denied the claim of service connection for cause of death due to lack of evidence of exposure to herbicide agents or radiation during service, and thus, the Veteran's lung cancer is not considered a service-connected disability.
The deciding factor: There was no objective evidence of exposure to ionizing radiation or herbicide agents while on active duty.
- Claimed conditions
- carcinoma of the lungs
- How they argued it
- Direct service connection
- Exposure basis
- None
- Rating assigned
- None in this decision
- Decision date
- October 10, 2019
- Citation
- 19177794
Veterans Law Judge
Decisions by this judge: 1,886 · Granted: 24% (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 19177794.
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Related decisions
Other Board decisions on a similar condition or argued the same way.
- Granted
The Board found that the Veteran was exposed to herbicide agents in the Korean DMZ and granted service connection for the cause of his death due to lung cancer, which is associated with such exposure.
- Denied
The Veteran's service-connected COPD was denied as it is not related to his active service or secondary to his service-connected carcinoma of the lungs. The Board also found that he did not meet the criteria for a TDIU prior to April 1, 2013.
- Remanded (sent back)
The Veteran's claims for service connection of carcinoma of the lungs and pneumonia are being remanded due to incomplete development, including a need for clarification on whether he wishes to testify before the Board.
- Remanded (sent back)
The Board has remanded the case for further development and readjudication, including consideration of new evidence submitted by the Veteran.
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