The Board remands the matter for additional development, including obtaining outstanding Community Care Program treatment records and associating them with the claims file.
The deciding factor: Further review of the Veteran's post-service VAMC treatment records reveals the existence of referrals to Community Care providers that do not appear to have been associated with the claims file. The Board finds these efforts demonstrate substantial compliance with the Board's previous remand directives, but an additional remand is warranted.
- Claimed conditions
- Bilateral hearing loss
- How they argued it
- Not specified
- Exposure basis
- None
- Rating assigned
- None in this decision
- Decision date
- January 26, 2024
- Citation
- 24004200
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.
- Denied
The Board denied the veteran's claim for service connection for bilateral hearing loss, as there was no evidence of a current disability in the right ear and insufficient evidence to establish a nexus between the left ear hearing loss and service.
- Remanded (sent back)
The Board remands the matter for a medical clarification regarding whether the Veteran's service-connected epilepsy has aggravated his bilateral hearing loss.
- Remanded (sent back)
The Board remands the claim for service connection for bilateral hearing loss to obtain an addendum opinion addressing the Veteran's lay statements regarding in-service acoustic trauma and a rocket blast injury.
- Partly granted
The Board granted an effective date of May 17, 2019, for a 70 percent disability rating for PTSD but denied earlier effective dates for service connection for bilateral hearing loss and tinnitus.
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