Citation Nr: 21011831
Decision Date: 03/02/21	Archive Date: 03/02/21

DOCKET NO. 18-35 320
DATE: March 2, 2021

ORDER

Service connection for left hip strain is granted.

FINDING OF FACT

Resolving reasonable doubt in the Veteran’s favor, the evidence is sufficient to establish that the Veteran’s left hip strain was caused by hospitalization for manifestations of service-connected diabetes.

CONCLUSION OF LAW

The criteria for service connection for left hip strain have been met. 38 U.S.C. §§ 1110, 5107(b); 38 C.F.R. §§ 3.102, 3.303.

REASONS AND BASES FOR FINDING AND CONCLUSION

The Veteran served on active duty from July 1997 to April 2004.

This matter comes before the Board of Veterans’ Appeals (Board) on appeal from a May 2018 rating decision of a Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) Regional Office (RO). In April 2020, the Board remanded the claim for an addendum opinion to address whether the Veteran’s left hip strain was at least as likely as not aggravated by the Veteran’s service-connected right hip disability. That development has been completed, so the Board may now adjudicate the claim on the merits. Dyment v. West, 13 Vet. App. 141, 146–47 (1999); Stegall v. West, 11 Vet. App. 268, 271 (1998). 

Generally, service connection may be established where there is evidence of (1) a current disability, (2) an in-service incurrence or aggravation of a disease or injury, and (3) a nexus between the claimed in-service event, injury, or disease and the present injury or disease. Shedden v. Principi, 381 F.3d 1163, 1167 (Fed. Cir. 2004). Service connection may also be granted for a disability which is proximately due to or aggravated in severity beyond its natural progression by a service-connected injury or disease, or for treatment for the service-connected disability. 38 U.S.C. § 1110; 38 C.F.R. § 3.310(a); Allen v. Brown, 7 Vet. App. 439 (1995).

Following the Board’s prior April 2020 decision, an addendum opinion was issued in December 2020 in which the clinician stated “[t]he Veteran’s left hip condition is at least as likely as not related to the Veteran’s hospitalization for necrotizing fasciitis in 2016 which caused some immobilization and had to undergo physical therapy.” VA treatment records of the Veteran’s hospitalization in 2016 show that the necrotizing fasciitis was related to the Veteran’s service-connected diabetes mellitus (“newly onset DM necrotizing fasciitis”). (The fact that the Veteran’s diabetes was not service connected until 2018 is not a bar to secondary service connection for a condition resulting from the manifestations of diabetes before that date. See Frost v. Shulkin, 29 Vet. App. 131, 137 (2017).)

Thus, resolving any reasonable doubt in the Veteran’s favor, the Board finds that the evidence is sufficient to establish that the Veteran’s left hip condition is at least as likely as not related to his hospitalization for a manifestation of service-connected diabetes. 38 U.S.C. §§ 1110, 5107(b); 38 C.F.R. §§ 3.102, 3.310. 

 

K. Parakkal

Veterans Law Judge

Board of Veterans’ Appeals

Attorney for the Board	M. Davis, Associate Counsel

The Board’s decision in this case is binding only with respect to the instant matter decided. This decision is not precedential and does not establish VA policies or interpretations of general applicability. 38 C.F.R. § 20.1303.