Citation Nr: 22017573
Decision Date: 03/25/22	Archive Date: 03/25/22

DOCKET NO. 17-55 580
DATE: March 25, 2022

REMANDED

Entitlement to service connection for skin cancer is remanded.

REASONS FOR REMAND

The Veteran served honorably, including a period of active duty from May 1979 to March 1983 and Reserve service thereafter until 1996. 

This matter comes before the Board of Veterans' Appeals (Board) on appeal from a January 2015 rating decision of a Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) agency of original jurisdiction (AOJ). In February 2021, the Board remanded the matter to verify the dates of the Veteran's Reserve service and to obtain a new etiology opinion.

Unfortunately, further remand is required in order to ensure that the Veteran is provided with a fully adequate opinion.

The Board's prior decision directed for a new opinion that considered whether the Veteran's skin cancer was related not just to his 3 years of active-duty service but also in addition to his Reserve service. Though a new opinion was obtained in December 2021, the clinician stated that he could not establish a nexus to "sun light exposure of 3 years." The failure to comply with the prior directive to provide an opinion considering the Veteran's combined sunlight exposure during his active duty and Reserve service requires remanding for a new opinion. Dyment v. West, 13 Vet. App. 141, 14647 (1999); Stegall v. West, 11 Vet. App. 268, 271 (1998).

On remand, the Board will direct for consideration of the Harvard Health questionnaire quoted in the representative's March 2022 informal hearing presentation, which stated that basal cell carcinoma, a cancer that service treatment records show was present on and removed from the Veteran's back during active duty service, "recurs at some other spot in the body in about 40% of people." 

Accordingly, the matter is REMANDED for the following action:

Obtain an addendum opinion regarding the etiology of the Veteran's skin cancer. The clinician must opine whether any skin cancer since approximately 2014 at least as likely as not (meaning an approximate positive and negative balance of the evidence) is related to the Veteran's combined service of active-duty service from May 1979 to March 1983 and 124 days of active duty training during 1986 and 1994 (including a two-day underwater dive in March 1988). 

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The clinician must consider and discuss (a) that service treatment records show that in January 1983 the Veteran had a "probable basal cell ca[ncer]" removed from his back, and that Harvard Health states that basal cell carcinoma "recurs at some other spot in the body in about 40% of people"; and (b) a June 21, 1979 active-duty service treatment note that the Veteran had a blistering sunburn on the lower leg.

 

 

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.