The Board granted service connection for the Veteran's cause of death due to acute myelocytic leukemia, finding that it was related to presumed exposure to Agent Orange during his active service in Vietnam.
The deciding factor: The evidence is at least evenly balanced or approximately so, as to whether the Veteran's AML is related to his presumed herbicide agent exposure during his active duty service. As the reasonable doubt created by this relative equipoise in the evidence must be resolved in favor of the Veteran, entitlement to service connection for the cause of the Veteran's death due to AML is warranted.
- Claimed conditions
- Acute myelocytic leukemia (AML)
- How they argued it
- Presumptive (no nexus needed)
- Exposure basis
- Agent Orange / herbicides
- Rating assigned
- None in this decision
- Decision date
- April 18, 2025
- Citation
- A25035895
Veterans Law Judge
Decisions by this judge: 835 · Granted: 22% (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 A25035895.
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 Board has granted service connection for acute myelocytic leukemia (AML) due to Agent Orange exposure, for purposes of accrued benefits.
- Denied
The Board denied the Veteran's claim for service connection for acute myelocytic leukemia (AML) due to Agent Orange exposure, finding that there is no evidence of a direct or presumptive relationship between his AML and his military service.
- Remanded (sent back)
The Board previously denied the claim for AML due to Agent Orange exposure, but the Court of Appeals for Veterans Claims (Court) has ordered a remand because the September 2014 VA examination did not discuss whether the leukemia was presumptively linked to Agent Orange. The Veteran's death while his appeal was pending at the Court necessitated substitution.
- Granted
The Board has granted the Appellant's application to reopen her previously denied claim for service connection for cause of the Veteran’s death, finding that his AML was related to his in-service exposure to herbicide agents. The cause of death is therefore considered service-connected.
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