Patrick Sawdy v. Commissioner of Social Securit

Filing

OPINION filed : We VACATE the district court s judgment with instructions to REMAND to the Commissioner for further proceedings consistent with this opinion, decision not for publication pursuant to local rule 206. Ralph B. Guy , Jr., Circuit Judge; Deborah L. Cook, AUTHORING Circuit Judge and Jane Branstetter Stranch, Circuit Judge.

Case: 09-2291

Document: 006111057273

Filed: 08/29/2011

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NOT RECOMMENDED FOR FULL-TEXT PUBLICATION
File Name: 11a0639n.06
No. 09-2291
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE SIXTH CIRCUIT

PATRICK SAWDY,

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Plaintiff-Appellant,
v.
COMMISSIONER OF SOCIAL
SECURITY,
Defendant-Appellee.

ON APPEAL FROM THE UNITED
STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE
EASTERN DISTRICT OF MICHIGAN
FILED

Aug 29, 2011
LEONARD GREEN, Clerk

Before: GUY, COOK, and STRANCH, Circuit Judges.

COOK, Circuit Judge. This case stems from an administrative law judge (ALJ) denying a
claimant disability benefits under the Social Security Act without giving controlling weight to the
claimant’s treating physicians or providing good reasons for not doing so. Because such action
violates the agency’s procedural regulations, we vacate the district court’s judgment and remand for
further proceedings consistent with this opinion.

I.

Appellant Patrick Sawdy has a history of mental and physical impairments. He suffers from
mood, anxiety, and paranoia disorders; and he has strained, fractured, and torn his left shoulder.

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These problems prompted Sawdy to apply for Social Security disability benefits, see 42 U.S.C. §§
416(i), 423(d), 1382c, and an ALJ held a hearing on his claim.

The record before the ALJ contained several doctors’ opinions on Sawdy’s shoulder
condition, including a 2003 letter from Dr. Gilyard, Sawdy’s treating orthopedic surgeon. After
examining Sawdy and ordering an MRI, Dr. Gilyard noted that Sawdy’s shoulder had “significant”
joint instability, and that the MRI revealed a labral tear that left Sawdy unable to work.

This opinion held little sway with the ALJ. When evaluating Sawdy’s shoulder, the ALJ
passed over Dr. Gilyard’s letter, choosing not to reference him by name. Instead, the ALJ found that
Sawdy’s medications, coupled with treatment records that preceded Dr. Gilyard’s opinion,
demonstrated that Sawdy could lift fifteen to twenty pounds occasionally and ten pounds frequently,
within certain restrictions.

Also in the record were opinions on Sawdy’s mental disorders, such as a 2007
correspondence from Dr. Lujan, Sawdy’s psychiatrist. Having treated Sawdy for several months,
Dr. Lujan opined that Sawdy had generalized anxiety disorder, dysthymic disorder, and schizoid
personality disorder; that he had a GAF score of only 40; and that, accordingly, he could not “work
in any capacity.”

Dr. Lujan’s opinion suffered a fate similar to Dr. Gilyard’s. In addressing Sawdy’s mental
condition, the ALJ brushed aside Dr. Lujan’s letter, noting that he treated Sawdy for only four

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months and based his opinion on “the claimant’s subjective reports.” After discussing Sawdy’s daily
activities, current medications, and earlier treatment records, the ALJ concluded that Sawdy’s mental
problems amounted to “‘moderate’ difficulties in social functioning” that would not prevent him
from performing “simple, repetitive tasks” in an isolated environment.

Based on these functional-capacity findings and Sawdy’s other characteristics, the ALJ asked
a vocational expert whether the economy offered a significant number of jobs that a person like
Sawdy could perform. The expert testified that a person with Sawdy’s limitations could find suitable
work as a packager or visual inspector, and that his conclusion accorded with the Dictionary of
Occupational Titles (DOT). The ALJ agreed. This meant that Sawdy could not collect benefits.

After unsuccessfully appealing to the Appeals Council, Sawdy filed this action in the district
court, arguing, among other things, that the ALJ committed procedural error by discounting his
treating physicians’ opinions without sufficient explanation. Ruling from the bench, the court
granted summary judgment to the Commissioner because “the ALJ’s decision is supported by
substantial evidence on the whole record and that means the decision must be upheld.”

II.

On appeal, Sawdy continues to argue that the ALJ committed procedural error in her handling
of Drs. Gilyard’s and Lujan’s medical opinions. With this we agree. He also contends that the
vocational expert gave insufficiently precise testimony. With this we disagree.

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In reviewing ALJ decisions, we ask two separate questions: whether the decision finds
support in substantial record evidence, and whether it conforms to proper legal standards. Rogers
v. Comm’r of Soc. Sec., 486 F.3d 234, 241 (6th Cir. 2007). Even when “substantial evidence
otherwise supports the [ALJ’s] decision,” we must remand if “the agency failed to follow its own
procedural regulation.” Wilson v. Comm’r of Soc. Sec., 378 F.3d 541, 544 (6th Cir. 2004).

The “treating source rule” is one such regulation. It demands that an ALJ give “controlling
weight” to a medical opinion of a claimant’s treating physician as long as it “is well-supported by
medically acceptable . . . diagnostic techniques” and “not inconsistent with the other substantial
evidence” in the record. 20 C.F.R. § 404.1527(d)(2). If an ALJ declines to give controlling weight
to such an opinion, the rule still requires the ALJ to fully consider it in accordance with certain
factors, id. § 404.1527(d)(2)–(6), and to provide “good reasons” for discounting the opinion, id. §
404.1527(d)(2)—i.e., reasons “sufficiently specific to make clear to any subsequent reviewers the
weight . . . [given] to the . . . opinion and the reasons for that weight,” SSR 96-2p, 1996 WL 374188,
at *5 (July 2, 1996).

The ALJ here failed to give Sawdy’s physicians the proper treating-source treatment. She
gave no reason why she deemed Dr. Gilyard’s opinion unworthy of “controlling weight,” and
provided no indication of what weight, if any, she attributed to it. And though the ALJ referenced
Dr. Lujan’s opinion and arguably found it unsupported by “acceptable . . . diagnostic techniques,”
see 20 C.F.R. § 404.1527(d)(2), she failed to then consider it in light of the § 404.1527(d) factors

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and explain the weight that it received in her analysis, along with the specific “good reasons” for that
weight.

The course that we must now follow is well charted: when an ALJ violates the treatingsource rule, “[w]e do not hesitate to remand,” and “we will continue remanding when we encounter
opinions from ALJ[s] that do not comprehensively set forth the reasons for the weight assigned to
a treating physician’s opinion.” Hensley v. Astrue, 573 F.3d 263, 267 (6th Cir. 2009) (first alteration
in original) (internal quotation marks and citation omitted).

Resisting this result, the Commissioner argues that substantial evidence nonetheless supports
the ALJ’s decision. But this is beside the point. We “cannot excuse the denial of a mandatory
procedural protection simply because . . . there is sufficient evidence in the record for the ALJ to
discount the treating source’s opinion and, thus, a different outcome on remand is unlikely,” because
this “would afford the Commissioner the ability [to] violate the regulation with impunity and render
the protections promised therein illusory.” Wilson, 378 F.3d at 546.

Though the foregoing analysis requires remand, Sawdy’s alternative argument would not.
He contends that the vocational expert failed to articulate the precise packaging and inspection jobs
in the DOT that he could allegedly perform, and that a number of these positions required abilities
beyond his. But Sawdy raised no objection to the vocational expert’s testimony below, the ALJ had
no “affirmative duty . . . to conduct an independent investigation into the testimony,” Martin v.
Comm’r of Soc. Sec., 170 F. App’x 369, 374 (6th Cir. 2006), and Sawdy presents no authority now
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demonstrating an inconsistency between these types of jobs and the limitations considered by the
expert.

III.

For these reasons, we vacate the district court’s judgment with instructions to remand to
the Commissioner for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.

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