Barbara Henry v. Comm of Social Security

Filing

Per Curiam OPINION filed: We AFFIRM the district court s judgment, decision not for publication. Danny J. Boggs, Circuit Judge; Eugene E. Siler, Jr., Circuit Judge and Bernice Bouie Donald, Circuit Judge.

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NOT RECOMMENDED FOR FULL-TEXT PUBLICATION
File Name: 17a0102n.06
No. 16-5502
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE SIXTH CIRCUIT

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

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FILED
Feb 08, 2017
DEBORAH S. HUNT, Clerk

ON APPEAL FROM THE UNITED
STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR
THE EASTERN DISTRICT OF
KENTUCKY

BEFORE: BOGGS, SILER, and DONALD, Circuit Judges.

PER CURIAM. Barbara Ann Henry appeals the district court’s judgment affirming the
denial of her application for disability-insurance benefits.
In 2006, Henry filed applications for disability-insurance benefits and supplementalsecurity-income benefits, alleging that she became disabled on April 19, 2004. After the Social
Security Administration denied the applications, Henry requested a hearing before an
administrative law judge (ALJ). The ALJ denied Henry relief. The Appeals Council declined to
review the case. The district court remanded the case for further administrative proceedings.
On remand, the ALJ conducted a second hearing. The ALJ determined that Henry was
disabled and eligible for supplemental-security-income benefits as of July 3, 2013, but that she
was not eligible for disability-insurance benefits because she became disabled after

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December 31, 2012, her date last insured. The Appeals Council declined to review the case.
The district court affirmed the ALJ’s decision.
On appeal, Henry argues that the ALJ failed to weigh properly the medical-opinion
evidence and that the ALJ erred by failing to analyze her case as a “borderline age case.” “Our
review of the ALJ’s decision is limited to whether the ALJ applied the correct legal standards
and whether the findings of the ALJ are supported by substantial evidence.” Blakley v. Comm’r
of Soc. Sec., 581 F.3d 399, 405 (6th Cir. 2009). Substantial evidence exists if a “reasonable mind
might accept the relevant evidence as adequate to support a conclusion.” Id. at 406. We review
de novo the district court’s conclusions on each issue. Id.
Henry first argues that the ALJ erred by failing to give controlling weight to the opinions
of treating physicians Dr. David Dome, who concluded that Henry would have limited use of her
left leg, and Dr. Debora Tallio, who concluded that, in accordance with a 2008 functionalcapacity evaluation, Henry was unable to maintain gainful employment. Henry also argues that
the ALJ erred by discounting the opinion of examining physician Dr. Andrew Koerber, who
concluded that Henry could perform, at most, a reduced range of sedentary work.
A medical opinion from a treating source must be given controlling weight if it is wellsupported by medically acceptable clinical and laboratory diagnostic techniques and not
inconsistent with other substantial evidence in the record. Gayheart v. Comm’r of Soc. Sec.,
710 F.3d 365, 376 (6th Cir. 2013). An ALJ must provide “good reasons” for discounting the
opinion of a treating source. Id. The stated reasons must be supported by the evidence in the
record and be sufficiently specific to make clear to subsequent reviewers the weight the ALJ
gave to the opinion and the reasons for that weight. Id. If a treating-source opinion is not given
controlling weight, the ALJ must weigh all of the medical opinions based on all relevant factors,

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including the nature of the treatment relationship, the specialization of the medical source, and
the consistency and supportability of the opinion. Id.
Substantial evidence supports the ALJ’s weighing of the medical opinions at issue.
Dr. Tallio’s statement that Henry is “unable to maintain gainful employment” is not entitled to
controlling weight because it addresses an issue that is reserved to the Commissioner. See
20 C.F.R. § 404.1527(d)(1). And the ALJ reasonably rejected Dr. Tallio’s conclusion that, in
accordance with the 2008 functional-capacity evaluation, Henry had severe functional
limitations. That conclusion conflicted with several other medical opinions that were much less
restrictive, including the opinions of Dr. Richard Sheridan, Dr. David Jackson, and most of
Dr. Dome’s opinion. It also conflicted with the majority of the other evidence in the record,
including the unremarkable clinical findings of Dr. R. Carter Cassidy and Dr. Jeffrey Selby.
The ALJ also reasonably rejected Dr. Dome’s opinion that Henry had limited use of her left leg
because that opinion conflicted with the diagnostic-testing evidence and the clinical findings of
several physicians, including Dr. Cassidy. Finally, it was reasonable for the ALJ to discount Dr.
Koerber’s opinion because the severity of his proposed restrictions was at odds with both the
relatively benign findings of his own examination of Henry and the evidence discussed above
that was contrary to Dr. Tallio’s opinion.
Henry also argues that the ALJ erred by failing to consider whether she should be treated
as a “person of advanced age” rather than a “person closely approaching advanced age” for
purposes of her application for disability insurance benefits, see 20 C.F.R. § 404.1563(d)-(e)
(defining a claimant that is age 50 to 54 as a “person closely approaching advanced age” and a
claimant that is 55 or older as a “person of advanced age”), because she turned 55 just over six
months after the date she was last insured. Henry relies on 20 C.F.R. § 404.1563(b), which
states that the Commissioner “will not apply the age categories mechanically in a borderline
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situation” and that, if a claimant is “within a few days to a few months of reaching an older age
category” and using the older age category would result in a determination of disability, the
Commissioner “will consider whether to use the older age category after evaluating the overall
impact of all the factors of [the] case.”
The ALJ did not err by failing to address explicitly whether to treat Henry as a person of
advanced age because § 404.1563(b) “does not impose on ALJs a per se procedural requirement
to address borderline age categorization in every borderline case.” See Bowie v. Comm’r of Soc.
Sec., 539 F.3d 395, 399 (6th Cir. 2008). And, given that Henry had done semiskilled work as a
truck driver, indicating that she is capable of doing light work, and that she was over six months
from advanced age on the date she was last insured, the record does not show that she suffered
from the sort of additional vocational adversities that would be significant enough to require the
ALJ to engage in a borderline age analysis. See Caudill v. Comm’r of Soc. Sec., 424 F. App’x
510, 516-18 (6th Cir. 2011); Bowie, 539 F.3d at 400-01.
Accordingly, we AFFIRM the district court’s judgment.

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