The Board has granted service connection for a chronic cervical spine condition, finding that the Veteran's current neck pain is related to his parachute landing during active military service.
The deciding factor: The VA examiner opined that the claimed neck disability was at least as likely as not related to his active military service based on the Veteran’s reports of neck pain since service and the number of jumps he performed as a parachutist.
- Claimed conditions
- chronic cervical spine condition
- How they argued it
- Direct service connection
- Exposure basis
- None
- Rating assigned
- None in this decision
- Decision date
- October 21, 2020
- Citation
- 20067972
Veterans Law Judge
Decisions by this judge: 2,011 · Granted: 24% (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 20067972.
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.
- Granted
The Veteran's claims for chronic contact dermatitis, degenerative disc disease (claimed as chronic back pain), and readjudication of service connection for neck condition are all granted. The Board found that the Veteran's conditions were related to his military service.
- Denied
The Board denied the Veteran's claims for service connection for various conditions, including left ear hearing loss, cervical spine condition, low back pain, right ear hearing loss, tinnitus, hypertensive cardiovascular disease, dyslipidemia, peptic ulcer disease, gastroesophageal reflux disease (GERD), and bilateral carpal tunnel syndrome. The Board found no new and material evidence to reopen the claim for left ear hearing loss.
- Denied
The Board denied the veteran's claims for increased ratings for his service-connected lumbar myositis, psychoneurosis and conversion hysteria, residuals of shrapnel wounds of the left thigh and pelvis with retained foreign bodies and scars, and residuals of shell fragment wounds of the right thigh and left leg. The veteran was also denied entitlement to a total disability rating based on individual unemployability due to service-connected disabilities.
- Denied
The Board denied the Veteran's claim for an initial evaluation in excess of 10 percent for his service-connected coronary artery disease, finding that the evidence did not support a higher rating based on the severity of his condition.
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