The Board remands the claims for an acquired psychiatric disorder and bilateral sensorineural hearing loss to correct pre-decisional duty to assist errors, specifically, to obtain the Veteran's service medical records not already associated with the claims file and to afford the Veteran another VA examination.
The deciding factor: Remand is required due to incomplete service medical records and inadequate medical opinions based on an absence of in-service evidence.
- Claimed conditions
- Acquired psychiatric disorder, to include a neurocognitive disorder, Bilateral sensorineural hearing loss
- How they argued it
- Direct service connection
- Exposure basis
- Camp Lejeune water
- Rating assigned
- None in this decision
- Decision date
- April 30, 2025
- Citation
- A25039828
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 Board granted service connection for an acquired psychiatric disorder, finding a causal relationship between the condition and an in-service incident of military sexual trauma (MST).
- Remanded (sent back)
The Board has remanded the issue of entitlement to service connection for an acquired psychiatric disorder due to a pre-decisional duty to assist error.
- Partly granted
The Board granted an effective date of May 29, 2019 for service connection for an acquired psychiatric disorder but denied earlier effective dates and increased ratings for other conditions.
- Granted
The Board granted service connection for an acquired psychiatric disorder, a right knee disorder, and a lumbar spine disorder.
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