The Veteran's service connection claims for bilateral lower and upper extremity disabilities are being remanded due to insufficient rationale in the previous VA opinions.
The deciding factor: Previous VA opinions were inadequate as they did not provide clear explanations for their conclusions regarding the etiology of the Veteran's disabilities.
- Claimed conditions
- bilateral lower extremity weakness, bilateral lower extremity numbness, bilateral upper extremity weakness, bilateral upper extremity numbness
- How they argued it
- Reopened with new and material evidence
- Exposure basis
- None
- Rating assigned
- None in this decision
- Decision date
- January 14, 2020
- Citation
- 20003334
Veterans Law Judge
Decisions by this judge: 1,902 · Granted: 11% (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 20003334.
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.
- Remanded (sent back)
The Board has remanded the Veteran's claims for service connection due to incomplete records and a need to verify his periods of active duty for training (ACDUTRA) and inactive duty for training (INACDUTRA).
- Granted
The Veteran's service-connected disabilities of essential tremors, headaches, bilateral upper and lower extremity weakness, and an acquired psychiatric disorder have caused him to be in the need of regular aid and attendance based on the need for assistance in activities of daily living and the inability to protect himself from the hazards incident to the daily environment. The Board has granted special monthly compensation (SMC) based on the need for aid and attendance.
- Denied
The Board denied a rating in excess of 20 percent for the Veteran's bilateral upper extremity numbness, finding that the evidence most closely characterizes the functional impact as mild incomplete paralysis.
- Granted
The Board has granted service connection for bilateral leg disability, vision disability, urinary incontinence, and bilateral upper extremity numbness as secondary to the Veteran's service-connected multiple sclerosis.
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