N OTE : This disposition is nonprecedential.


# United States **Court of Appeals**  **for the Federal Circuit**

______________________
WALTER C. REHM, JR., Claimant

- Appellant

v.

ROBERT A. MCDONALD, SECRETARY OF VETERANS AFFAIRS, Respondent

- Appellee

______________________

2015

- 7065

______________________
Appeal from the United States Court of Appeals for Veterans Claims in No. 13

- 3188, Judge Lawrence B. Hagel.

______________________

Decided: March 2, 2016

______________________

M ATTHEW J. I LACQUA , Chisholm Chisholm & Kilpa trick , Providence, RI, argued for claimant

- appellant. Also represented by Z ACHARY S TOLZ
, R OBERT V INCENT C HISHOLM ; C HRISTOPHER J. C LAY , Disabled American Veterans, C old Spring, KY; B ARBARA J. C OOK , Cincinnati, OH.

M ARTIN M. T OMLINSON , Commercial Litigation Branch, Civil Division, United States Department ofREHM v. MCDONALD 2

Justice, Washington, DC, argued for respondent -appellee. Also represented by E LIZABETH M. H OSFORD
, R OBERT E. K IRSCHMAN
, J R
., B ENJAMIN C. M IZER ; M ARTIE A DELMAN
, Y. K EN L EE , Office of General Counsel, United States D epartment of Veterans Affairs , Washington, DC

.

______________________

Before L OURIE
, W ALLACH
, and S TOLL
, Circuit Judges.

S TOLL
, Circuit Judge

. Walter C. Rehm appeals from the final decision of the United States Court of Appeals for Veterans Claims (“Veterans Court”) affirming the decision of the Board of Veterans Appeals (“Board”) , which denied Mr. Rehm entitlement to service

- connected benefits for a p sychiatric disorder. Rehm v. McDonald , No. 13

- 3188, 2015 WL
78764 (Vet. App. Jan. 7, 2015). Because Mr. Rehm fails to present a question within our jurisdiction, we dismiss.

Our jurisdiction to review decisions of the Veterans Court is limited by statute . We may review a Veterans Court decision with respect to the validity of a decision on a rule of law or the validity or interpretation of any sta tute or regulation relied on by the Veterans Court in making the decision. 38 U.S.C. § 7292(a). Unless a

co nstitutional issue is presented, we have no jurisdiction to review questions of fact or the application of a law or regulation to a particular set of facts. Id. § 7292(d)(2).

Mr. Rehm first argues that the Veter ans Court i nterpret ed the term “adequate medical opinion” and, in doing so, contradict ed the requirement in 38 C.F.R. § 4.1 that “accurate and fully descriptive medical examinations

a re required. ” In particular, Mr. Rehm asserts that to be adequate, the medical opinions that the Board considered in his case sho uld have discuss ed lay evidence, such as statements regarding his behavior following an accident he witness ed during his military service.REHM v. MCDONALD 3

Mr. Rehm next argues that the Veterans Court misi nterpreted 38 U.S.C. § 7104 , whi ch requires the Board to provide the reasons or bases for its findings , when it stated that the medical “examiners were not required to discuss all favorable evidence; rather t he Board, in relying on an opinion that does not do so, must discuss any add itional favorable evidence to comply with its duty to pr ovide an adequate statement of the reasons or bases for its decision.” Rehm , 2015 WL 78764, at * 3

. Mr. Rehm

asserts that the Board could not fill in gaps in the allege dly inadequate medical opinions by providing its own evaluation of the lay evidence of record.

Although Mr. Rehm attempts to frame th ese two i ssue s as legal question s , “the mere recitation of a basis for jurisdic tion by a party or a court[ ] is not controlling; we must look to the true n ature of the action.” Livingston v. Derwinski , 959 F.2d 224, 225 (Fed. Cir. 1992). As we have stated:

[W]e have been asked on several occasions to e xercise our jurisdiction to judge the sufficiency of a medical opinion. In each in stance . . . we have di smissed the appeals for want of jurisdiction on the ground that whether a medical opinion is ad equate is a question of fact. . . .

In each of these several cases, we correctly dete rmined that the sufficiency of a medical opinion is a matter beyond our jur isdictional reach, because the underlying question is one of fact.

Prinkey v. Shinseki , 735 F.3d 1375, 1382 (Fed. Cir. 2013) ( collecting cases ). We similarly conclude here that Mr. Rehm rais es issue s regarding only the sufficiency of medical opinion s , an issue of fact outside of our jurisdiction.

Accordingly, we dismiss Mr. Rehm’s appeal for lack of jurisdiction

.REHM v. MCDONALD 4

DISMISSED

C OSTS

No costs

.