The Board has remanded the claim of service connection for type II diabetes mellitus due to herbicide exposure, as it requires further action to verify the Veteran's exposure within 12 nautical miles of the Republic of Vietnam.
The deciding factor: Further verification is needed regarding the Veteran's ship assignments and dates, and any additional service personnel records showing the USS Caliente's location during its deployment in the Western Pacific (WESTPAC) cruise from September 1967 to November 1968.
- Claimed conditions
- type II diabetes mellitus
- How they argued it
- Presumptive (no nexus needed)
- Exposure basis
- Burn pits / airborne hazards
- Rating assigned
- None in this decision
- Decision date
- January 29, 2020
- Citation
- 20006437
Veterans Law Judge
Decisions by this judge: 1,726 · Granted: 19% (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 20006437.
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 claims for service connection for a back disorder, high blood pressure, and type II diabetes mellitus due to errors in development of the claim.
- Granted
The Veteran's service-connected PTSD prevented him from securing and following a substantially gainful occupation.,Given the grant of TDIU based on his service-connected PTSD, the Veteran has a single service-connected disability rated as total (PTSD) and additional service-connected disabilities independently ratable at 60 percent or more.
- Dismissed
The Veteran withdrew all appeals regarding his service-connected conditions and related disability ratings, effective as of March 16, 2026.
- Denied
The Board has denied the Veteran's claims for service connection for bilateral plantar fasciitis, sinusitis, hypertension, and type II diabetes mellitus due to a lack of current diagnoses or evidence linking these conditions to his active-duty service.
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