Citation Nr: 21024873
Decision Date: 04/26/21	Archive Date: 04/26/21

DOCKET NO. 18-27 282
DATE: April 26, 2021

ORDER

Service connection for a left-shoulder condition is granted.

FINDING OF FACT

The evidence establishes that the Veteran’s current left-shoulder disability is at least as likely as not related to an in-service motor vehicle accident.

CONCLUSION OF LAW

The criteria for service connection for a left-shoulder condition have been met. 38 U.S.C. §§ 1110, 1131; 38 C.F.R. § 3.303.

REASONS AND BASES FOR FINDING AND CONCLUSION

The Veteran served on active duty from April 1964 to March 1966.

This matter comes before the Board of Veterans’ Appeals (Board) on appeal from a July 2017 rating decision of a Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) Regional Office (RO). In February 2021, the Board remanded the claim to obtain an adequate VA opinion. 

After review of the evidence, the Board finds service connection for a left shoulder is warranted.

Service connection may be established for disability resulting from personal injury suffered or disease contracted in the line of duty in the active military, naval, or air service. 38 U.S.C. §§ 1110, 1131; 38 C.F.R. § 3.303. Establishing service connection generally requires 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). 

The evidence establishes that the Veteran is currently diagnosed with a left-shoulder labral tear including SLAP, status post-SLAP repair and post-subacromial decompression. 

The Veteran has contended that his shoulder condition was incurred during service when he was involved in a motor vehicle accident while he was working in the back of an ambulance. The occurrence of this in-service event has already been conceded by VA in a November 2020 rating decision granting service connection for spine disabilities related to the same motor vehicle accident. Moreover, military personnel records confirm that the Veteran was an ambulance driver during service, and the Veteran is competent to relate the details of an in-service injury. See, e.g., 38 C.F.R. § 3.159(a)(2). 

Following the Board’s February 2021 remand, a new VA opinion was provided the same month at which it was found that the Veteran’s left shoulder condition is at least as likely as not related to the in-service accident. The clinician noted that though the Veteran’s separation medical examination did not mention a shoulder condition, “[i]njuries sustained from MVAs can present months and years later.” Moreover, “[a]s the Veteran was in the back of an ambulance, there may not have been seatbelts available for the servicemembers, resulting in his body being thrown around.” 

The Board acknowledges negative etiology opinions from VA clinicians in March 2020 and October 2020. Both of these opinions were found inadequate for simply stating that there were no service treatment records showing a left-shoulder injury, and for the same reason the Board finds they are of less probative value as to a connection to service. E.g., Dalton v. Nicholson, 21 Vet. App. 23, 39, 40 (2007).

As the most probative evidence of record establishes that the Veteran’s current left-shoulder condition is related to the in-service motor vehicle accident, service connection is granted. 38 U.S.C. §§ 1110, 1131; 38 C.F.R. § 3.303.

 

 

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.