The Veteran's hearing loss disability is rated as noncompensable prior to August 9, 2017 and a 10% rating is granted from that date. The Board finds the evidence insufficient for service connection of asthma and COPD due to in-service exposure.
The deciding factor: The VA examiner did not provide an opinion regarding whether the Veteran's asthma and COPD are related to his in-service herbicide agent exposure or environmental conditions in Guam, as required by the February 2016 remand directive.
- Claimed conditions
- Asthma and Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD), Bilateral Hearing Loss
- How they argued it
- Not specified
- Exposure basis
- None
- Rating assigned
- None in this decision
- Decision date
- December 10, 2019
- Citation
- 19192673
Veterans Law Judge
Decisions by this judge: 2,421 · Granted: 29% (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 19192673.
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 bilateral hearing loss is granted as service-connected. The claims for alcohol abuse and psychiatric disorder are remanded for additional development, including a VA examination to determine the nature and etiology of these conditions.
- Remanded (sent back)
The Board has decided to remand the case due to a need for a new VA examination to assess the current severity of the Veteran's bilateral hearing loss. The issue remains under direct service connection theory.
- Denied
The Veteran's hearing loss was rated at 30 percent, the highest non-compensable rating available. The Board found that his hearing loss did not warrant a higher rating based on VA examinations and medical records.
- Denied
The Board denied the Veteran's claim for service connection for bilateral hearing loss, finding that there was no evidence of a nexus between his current hearing loss and his active service. The Board noted that while he had complaints of earaches in service, these did not indicate a current disability.
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