court's decision and it cites to no law for what it proposes the new rule it proposes and that new rule indeed has no basis in any law or regulation applies to the v  he wrote that he was seeking s c or service connection for disability and service the veterans court took that general statement as incomplete disability to potentially cure that's the language that it uses to cure that general statement and that requirement on v a to take what is a complete form is a little off point but i think relevant that is suppose of a veteran is thinking of making a claim and he's not sure whether he's going to be able to establish service connection and he asked the v a to supply him copies of his service records does he have the opportunity to secure those in a prompt manner yeah sure i think he does and so if we look we can look at the the regulations that exist in the time of mr sellers and for a long time before and after and this court case law for instance in the flashman case where if the developer it reaches out to  figure out whether i have a claim here he said i'd like the v a to supply me with a copy of my service records is it does do the regulations provide that the v a will supply those records i think they do and that that would be most likely to be considered to be an informal the beginning of the informal plan process so that would begin the process  said suggested to me that you're taking the position the program would say that if a veteran simply walked into the v and a they are sent down and said by the way now i please have all my medical  i don't believe so everything is connected to that to a claim within the within the claims process and frankly stan i don't know if a veteran submitted of some form of request saying i want all my records  it i would be interested in knowing whether a veteran has that right under the regulations and this is to choose could you also check and see if the veteran has a right to get those service military records from the actual branch of service here see serve then rather than to be a few might not initially have them right and that's one of the issues that i'm thinking of your honor is that you know what may or may not be directly in was your view of what you agree of specificity is require your honour's as you know we explained at length in the briefs and i think that one can also pulls directly out of the regulations the on the formal form and walk seventeen what she told the r was that have been sufficient to have a formal claim no and i formal clean in block seventeen nature of the sickness degree or illness is made someone there come in and say i've got she said i'm having trouble remembering things i've got problems i have with this accident back and forth action was on such and such a date why isn't that sufficient as in the oh i'm sorry your honor that i think would be sufficient i thought you were referring to her in the shade case designation seventeen she had written what i just said about her head problem and they were asked and she said by the way i'm going where of a medical record that would support this and she cited the record and that was all she said in block seventeen would specificity is required in the form by v a practice is very low so it can be identifying a body part it can be identifying a problem like a memory problem it does have to be something so then what good would it be your position that and fifteen regulations would it be sufficient if the formal claim had the same level of specificity as that existed in the shade case i believe so because the into the historical treatment and the continuity and the treatment of claims and how they're read and interpreted and that three dollars does not represent a break from that continuity so i think that the expansive reading of clans would continue with the new forms of a better and put down body parts and things like that describing the difficulty that he or she was having that that would constitute a to address judge ickes question relative to obtaining records i believe that prior to the filing of an application there is no v a regulation that provides for any obligation on the part of the secretary to provide either service records or treatment records unless those records are already in when a veteran well there are two answers to that one has to do with the prior version of the regulation which is at issue here and i'll address that st at the time that a informal claim is filed the duty to assist does not trigger what happened under the prior version is that the secretary specifically provided that in the event that a formal claim was presented that he would submit provide to the veteran or other claimant a da form in order to initiate a formal claim and that he or she had one year to submit that formal claim and then that would trigger the duty to assist from the time that the informal claim was filed until the time that a formal claim was filed which had to be within that one year window there is no duty to assist under the prior version of three point one five five a how to address judge dikes question relative to service records service records can be obtained by any veteran from the national record center from the national archives is in st louis the national personnel records center will respond to any veteran to be provided their service records they no longer have to go to the individual service departments the service departments are supposed to individual service departments are supposed to submit those to the national personnel records center you now i'd like to address the question of the degree of specificity that judge clevenger spoke of i agree that that is the central issue in this case and i believe that the government's position is based upon their interpretation of the law as it applies to informal claims even though both parties agree that the informal claim is not what was that issue here it is the case law related to the specificity question for an informal sellers position that there is no provision that requires specificity  a formal claim and that is important to understand the distinction here because the claim being made in this case was a claim for compensation but is filled out on the  for service connection you don't even have to identify the current disability or you do well in order to prevail you do have to expert and not does not necessarily know the right verbiage to describe what their disability may or may not be i'm not and i'm not understanding what the answer is does the veteran have to say i have a current disability describe it as to what it is on the form formal claim for our county just say please look at my records and see if i have any clients well box seventeen in this was empty and all the other boxes relating to specific acts they were empty and all there was a box forty saying request service connection for disability occurring during active service to actually do service with that have been a sufficient for claim yes or no it would probably be considered technically to be an incomplete claim but the secretary has the discretion to parch you saying in your case that it is sufficient to be a formal clearly i am saying in this case it is because mr sellers provided enough information to identify that there were service medical records that showed an injury whil service and there but it was not a leg injury right that's correct your honor but that triggered the responsibility for the secretary to obtain all of his service department record  back and understand your position you're saying as long as the veteran identifies some specific disability on the form that's the position but he does have to identify some disability on the form but once he does that the veterans administration has the obligation to see if there are any other disability related were unrelated supported by the medical records that you're that is correct your honor  and then in their box twelve or seventeen he just says i have disabilities resulting from service because i was injured without any for their description of the nature of the disability or the  specific enough yes you are i believe it is and i think we need to stay away from the term specifically it is only necessary that the veterans identify an injury or disease that incur was incurred in service and they used hypothetical there was no such identification that's right and i believe that it would be sufficient in judge refuses hypothetical to trigger the provisions of the duty to  dyke framed it in terms of know the identifying a disability the veteran need not identify a disability he need only identify that he was injured in service or suffered a disease or a pre service injury or disease was aggravated during service it is then incumbent upon the secretary to assist the veteran in developing facts pertinent to a claim for disability compensation the claim here is for compensation the claim here is not for any specific disability although the veteran could and often does identify a specific disability that difference is important here because if you make it too specific then the secretary is able to do what the secretary is attempting to do here and say that we don't have the obligation to read the entire service decision that grants every benefit that can be supported in the law and that's why this court as early as road has consistently held that a reasonably raised claim either by the evidence or by what the veteran says either in his application or in a later submission has to be developed by the secretary the secretary cannot simply ignore that as that is the secretary's position here because it's not on the v a form five to six i'm sorry was there a question i'd like the secretary to see if i have any compensable service connection claims that would be sufficient right i do not  that would be sufficient however it is what it is terry waite in addition to that what does he have to say i think he has to complete the form to the satisfaction of the secretary the secretary may return and incomplete for him to the veteran and not accept that form and say this is an incomplete form and i will not act on your claim until you give me a completed four or in the language of the statute a substantially completed form and it is sufficiently complete form that he could proceed and once he did the secretary's duty to assist continued and that duty to assist cannot be constrained as the government argues in this case ok mr carpenter you there i am here your honor i think judge choose withdraws his question unless my colleagues have any further questions i think were finished with your side of the argument talked about certain disabilities and injuries and reference certain medical records if those medical records had contained additional diagnosis like p t s d or mental health thing would that have been considered raising the clay and so that this would have been the the starting date for the payment of benefits not as a matter necessarily as a matter understanding the question is is that would be sufficient to state the claim for what had been identified meeting to the injury the nature of the sickness disease or injury identified which is what they asked for in box seventeen and so that statement and identifying the records would be the the formal claim for those for that sickness or injury the same situation similar medical record with specificity that included it a diagnosis of mental health disease and that after the education process it was determined that that was service connected with that of the record without anything else identifying the disability be sufficient for this to be the starting date ok just to make sure i understand the question so we're not we don't want to drive by each right and i think the key there though the key right is that the da always has the ability to look and construct and it's worth trying to work with the claimants to find what's there and that hypothetical and i sure there was an adjudication you know that there were you're out of time but let me ask you this just one more way to make sure i'm that you're giving me the and i don't want to hold you to an answer that i don't know you're giving or not if the form specifies a medical record but doesn't specify a specific disability if that medical record contains that other disability that is subsequently granted service connection is that near a dedication about medical records on this form the enough for an effective date of the date of the form i think you've said yes and then yes so i'm just trying to get a clear disability but not the one for which service connection was ultimately granted which was the case in shady as well as well but again the distinction between this hypothetical the one we just did is also important there's a v a education as you anymore i do want to pursue that for one more minute and she identified medical records and said please obtain these records and grant benefits and that was health sufficient to be an informal point is that please obtain these records and grant benefit identifying specific medical records is that sufficient for a formal claim for any disability disclosed in the records be considered incomplete because it doesn't identify the nature of the nd spread it could go back to the claimant to fill in that information now i would add because we have also have this hypothetical sort of bouncing around if there is a disability identified and then in that box seventeen those other generalized statements that don't connect to anything if the a did not take that to be a formal claim and issued a decision the claimant would have the right you know as  vitiated in her case was to file a notice of disagreement and that could then open up continue the process to get something that the claimant thought she put in the v a was not able to construct out of what was put down and insufficient what is it like it is the claim is insufficient unless it identifies the specific disability for which benefits are being sought and that's why mr sellers  heard from him for fifteen years and then came back and now is trying to reopen that under base the sole basis of box forty and that's the trap of mr carpenter's argument is that if you put in some disability on the form now that meant that v a at the time had to look for every conceivable disability and not they would know what was a disability all the veterans knows what is