The Veteran's bilateral hearing loss claim has been reopened, but the Board is remanding it for further development.,The Veteran's right knee and lumbar spine disability claims have also been reopened, with both being remanded for additional examination and opinion.
The deciding factor: New evidence received since the last final denial suggests that the Veteran may have developed these conditions during service or due to in-service exposures. However, the current medical opinions are inadequate as they do not consider the Veteran's lay statements regarding his symptoms.
- Claimed conditions
- Bilateral Eye Condition, Bilateral Hearing Loss (HL), Degenerative Joint Disease (DJD) of the Right Knee, Degenerative Joint Disease (DJD) of the Lumbar Spine, Left Knee Disability
- How they argued it
- Not specified
- Exposure basis
- None
- Rating assigned
- None in this decision
- Decision date
- November 7, 2019
- Citation
- 19184361
Veterans Law Judge
Decisions by this judge: 2,062 · Granted: 34% (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 19184361.
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.
- Denied
The Veteran's service-connected knee disabilities are rated at 10% each, and the Board finds that higher ratings are not warranted based on the evidence of record.
- Denied
The Board has determined that the Veteran's bilateral knee disabilities are not related to his active service, and thus denied both claims for service connection.
- Denied
The Veteran's left knee disability is currently rated at 30 percent, and the Board finds no evidence of clear and unmistakable error in assigning an effective date of June 19, 2002.
- Remanded (sent back)
The Board has decided to remand the Veteran's claims for increased ratings for his low back, left knee, and right knee disabilities due to inadequate VA examinations. The AOJ is instructed to obtain private treatment records from Mays & Schnapp Pain Management and schedule the Veteran for additional medical examinations.
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