The Board has remanded the Veteran's claim for service connection for a cervical/lumbar spine disability, to include as secondary to a left shoulder disability due to inadequate medical opinions and failure to comply with prior remand directives.
The deciding factor: The VA examiner did not adequately address the Court's concerns or the Board's remand directives regarding the Veteran's lay testimony and the lack of contemporaneous medical evidence.
- Claimed conditions
- Cervical/lumbar spine disability
- How they argued it
- Direct service connection
- Exposure basis
- None
- Rating assigned
- None in this decision
- Decision date
- October 14, 2021
- Citation
- 21063584
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 21063584.
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 case due to inadequate medical opinions regarding the Veteran's cervical and lumbar spine disabilities, specifically their onset during service or relation to a left shoulder injury.
- Denied
The Board denied service connection for a cervical/lumbar spine disability and granted service connection for pes planus of the left foot, both related to the Veteran's right foot pes planus.
- 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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