The Veteran's TDIU claim from February 3, 2015 is granted. The Board finds that the Veteran is unable to maintain substantially gainful employment due to service-connected disabilities and remands for further examination on issues of service connection.
The deciding factor: The Board found that the evidence was at least in equipoise as to whether the Veteran's service-connected disabilities rendered him unable to secure or follow a substantially gainful occupation, and thus granted TDIU from February 3, 2015. The issues of service connection for neck disorder and migraines are remanded.
- Claimed conditions
- Degenerative Joint Disease (DJD) in the cervical spine, Migraines
- How they argued it
- Not specified
- Exposure basis
- None
- Rating assigned
- None in this decision
- Decision date
- November 22, 2019
- Citation
- 19188651
Veterans Law Judge
Decisions by this judge: 2,200 · Granted: 43% (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 19188651.
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.
- Granted
The Veteran's initial evaluation for tension headaches to include migraines is granted, with a rating of 50 percent effective from May 23, 2023.
- Remanded (sent back)
The Veteran's claim for a compensable disability rating for tension and migraine headaches is remanded due to the inadequacy of the September 2020 VA examination report, which did not consider the ameliorative effects of medication.
- Denied
The Veteran's appeal for a higher rating for his migraine headaches was denied as the evidence did not show that his migraines were productive of severe economic inadaptability.
- Denied
The Veteran's PTSD with TBI is rated at 70 percent, which is denied as the criteria for a higher rating are not met.
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