The Veteran's claims for service connection, increased ratings, and TDIU are being remanded due to the need for additional examinations and medical opinions. The SMC claim is also inextricably intertwined with these issues.
The deciding factor: The current evidence does not adequately address the severity of the Veteran’s disabilities since her last examination, necessitating new VA examinations and medical opinions.
- Claimed conditions
- RDS (Reflex Dystrophy Syndrome), Healed right ankle fractures with severe sprain, Left metatarsal fracture
- How they argued it
- Secondary to another service-connected condition
- Exposure basis
- None
- Rating assigned
- None in this decision
- Decision date
- October 26, 2020
- Citation
- 20068965
Veterans Law Judge
Decisions by this judge: 1,680 · 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 20068965.
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 left foot disability, manifested by a fracture of the metatarsals, has been rated as 10 percent disabling since January 1, 2008. The Board finds that his symptoms more nearly approximate severe symptomatology for the entire rating period under appeal and grants an increased rating to 30 percent.
- Granted
The Board has granted a 10 percent evaluation for the veteran's service-connected residuals of a left metatarsal fracture, finding that these symptoms more closely approximate the criteria for a moderate foot injury.
- Granted
The Board has determined that the Veteran's headaches are at least as likely as not caused by his service-connected traumatic brain injury, and thus grants service connection for this condition.
- Remanded (sent back)
The Board has remanded the claims for service connection for hypertension and peripheral neuropathy of the bilateral upper and lower extremities due to insufficient medical opinions regarding their etiology.
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