The Board remands the issues of entitlement to service connection for an acquired psychiatric disability and a left knee disability due to further development needed, specifically the acquisition of prison medical records.
The deciding factor: Further development is necessary as the AOJ did not reassess whether the requested records do not exist or are unavailable after the Veteran provided authorization forms.
- Claimed conditions
- Generalized anxiety disorder, Other specified depressive disorder, Alcohol use disorder, Left knee disability
- How they argued it
- Direct service connection
- Exposure basis
- None
- Rating assigned
- None in this decision
- Decision date
- April 29, 2025
- Citation
- A25039112
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.
- Partly granted
The Board granted service connection for chronic headaches, CFS, dermatosis, bilateral RLS, a lumbar spine disability, and sleep apnea but denied a compensable evaluation for allergic rhinitis.
- Granted
The Board granted an effective date of May 9, 2022, for the grant of service connection for posttraumatic stress disorder with generalized anxiety disorder, other specified depressive disorder, and alcohol use disorder.
- Granted
The Board granted a 70 percent evaluation for the Veteran's acquired psychiatric disorder, to include PTSD and other specified trauma and stressor disorder and alcohol use disorder, resolving reasonable doubt in favor of the Veteran.
- Partly granted
The Board denied the claims for an initial compensable rating for left ear sensorineural hearing loss, service connection for a right ear hearing loss disability, and a left eye disorder. However, it granted service connection for a back disability and radiculopathy of both lower extremities as secondary to the back disability.
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