The Board has granted service connection for an upper back disability, a low back disability, and a right shoulder disability. The claims are remanded for further development regarding the increased rating claim for the right hand.
The deciding factor: The Board found that there was at least equipoise evidence to support the Veteran's claims of service connection for his disabilities, granted them based on the combat presumption, and ordered further development for the right hand disability as it had worsened since the last examination.
- Claimed conditions
- upper back (cervical spine), low back, right shoulder
- How they argued it
- Direct service connection
- Exposure basis
- None
- Rating assigned
- None in this decision
- Decision date
- December 5, 2019
- Citation
- 19191343
Veterans Law Judge
Decisions by this judge: 2,435 · Granted: 22% (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 19191343.
What this means for you
A grant means the Board agreed the veteran was entitled to the benefit. Decisions like this show the kind of evidence and arguments that tend to succeed for claims like it.
What you can do next
Related decisions
Other Board decisions on a similar condition or argued the same way.
- Dismissed
The Veteran's appeal regarding the April 1, 2020 rating decision was dismissed because he did not timely file a VA Form 10182 and good cause has not been shown to extend the filing deadline.
- Remanded (sent back)
The Board has remanded the claims for left knee, right knee, left wrist, right wrist, and right shoulder disabilities due to duty-to-assist errors and to address the ameliorative effects of medication.
- Denied
The Veteran's claim for automobile or adaptive equipment was denied as she does not have service-connected physical loss of use of her hands, permanent impairment of vision in both eyes, a severe burn injury, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), or ankylosis of the knees or hips.
- Dismissed
The Veteran withdrew their appeals, leading to the dismissal of all issues on appeal.
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