Citation Nr: 18159733
Decision Date: 12/20/18	Archive Date: 12/19/18

DOCKET NO. 09-46 358
DATE:	December 20, 2018
REMANDED
Entitlement to an initial evaluation in excess of 10 percent for right hip degenerative joint disease prior to January 8, 2013 is remanded.
Entitlement to an evaluation in excess of 30 percent for status post right total hip arthroplasty for the time period from March 1, 2014.
Entitlement to a rating in excess of 20 percent for supraspinatus tendonitis of the left shoulder is remanded. 
REASONS FOR REMAND
The Veteran served on active duty from September 1991 to September 1995, September 2002 to January 2004, December 2005 to April 2006, and May 2007 to July 2008. 
This matter is before the Board of Veterans’ Appeals (Board) on appeal from a June 2009 rating decision of a Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) Regional Office (RO). 
This matter was before the Board in February 2016 and July 2017 when it was remanded for further development.
Additional information has come to light since the previous Board remands that requires additional development. During the November 2017 VA examination, the Veteran reported that he has been receiving Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI) since 2014. The medical records associated with the SSDI claim are not of record and may contain information pertinent to evaluation of the Veteran’s service-connected disabilities on appeal. Additional development is therefore necessary to adequately consider the Veteran’s claim. 
Additionally, the record reflects that the Veteran did not report for VA examinations scheduled in October 2017. Although he has not provided good cause reasons for not reporting for these examinations, the record reflects that shortly after the date of the examinations, the Veteran submitted a change of address request which indicates a different address than reflected in the examination request. As the timing of this change of address request raises questions as to whether any contemporaneous notice letter sent to the Veteran regarding the date of an examination may not have reached him, and given that the claims are already being remanded to obtain additional outstanding records, an attempt should be made to schedule the Veteran for another VA examination. 
The matters are REMANDED for the following action:
1. Obtain the Veteran’s federal records from the Social Security Administration. Document all requests for information as well as all responses in the claims file.
2. Obtain and associate with the record VA treatment records from June 2017 to the present.
3. After completing the development requested in items 1 and 2, schedule the Veteran for examinations by an appropriate clinician to determine the current severity of his service-connected right hip and left shoulder disabilities.  
Any notice letter sent to the Veteran regarding the date of the examinations should inform him of the consequences of a failure to report for the examinations.  
The examiner should provide a full description of the disabilities and report all signs and symptoms necessary for evaluating the Veteran’s disabilities under the rating criteria.  The examiner must attempt to elicit information regarding the severity, frequency, and duration of any flare-ups, and the degree of functional loss during flare-ups.  
If it is not possible to provide a specific measurement, or an opinion regarding flare-ups, symptoms, or functional impairment without speculation, the examiner must state whether the need to speculate is due to a deficiency in the state of general medical knowledge (no one could respond given medical science and the known facts), a deficiency in the record (additional facts are required), or the examiner (does not have the knowledge or training).
 
M. SORISIO
Veterans Law Judge
Board of Veterans’ Appeals
ATTORNEY FOR THE BOARD	M. H. White, Associate Counsel