Buck v. Berryhill, No. 14-35976 (9th Cir. 2017)
Annotate this CaseThe Ninth Circuit reversed the denial of Disability Insurance Benefits and Supplemental Security Income, holding that plaintiff's contention that the ALJ made two errors at step two of its analysis of disability claims had no merit; all impairments were taken into account both times; any alleged error was harmless and could not be the basis for remand; using the shorthand "personality disorder" did not indicate any error in the ALJ's determination of plaintiff's residual functioning capacity (RFC); Dr. Kenderdine's partial reliance on plaintiff's self-reported symptoms was not a reason to reject his opinion; conflict in the record corroborated the rejection of Dr. Toews' testimony as a basis for rejecting Dr. Kenderdine's opinion; the ALJ did not err in rejecting Dr. Schechter's opinion; plaintiff's complaint that the ALJ only considered Dr. Fisher's opinion in the third section of a submitted form and ignored the first section lacked merit; any error in excluding three jobs identified by the vocational expert (VE) was harmless; but, the vast discrepancy between the VE's job numbers and those tendered by plaintiff, presumably from the same source, was simply too striking to be ignored. Therefore, this inconsistency in the record must be addressed by the ALJ on remand.
Court Description: Social Security. The panel reversed the district court’s judgment affirming the Commissioner of Social Security’s denial of claimant’s applications for Disability Insurance Benefits and Supplemental Security Income under the Social Security Act, and remanded for further administrative proceedings. The panel rejected claimant’s contentions that the administrative law judge (“ALJ”) erred at step two of the five-step sequential analysis by not adequately incorporating all severe impairments into the determination of claimant’s residual functional capacity, and by calling his antisocial personality disorder merely a “personality disorder” without qualification. The panel held that step two is merely a threshold determination meant to screen out weak claims, and was not meant to identify the impairments that should be taken into account when determining the residual functional capacity. The panel further held that step two was decided in claimant’s favor, and he could not possibly have been prejudiced, and any alleged error was therefore harmless. Concerning the rejection of Dr. Kenderdine’s opinion, which involved a psychiatric evaluation, the panel held that in the context of this case, Dr. Kenderdine’s partial reliance on claimant’s self-reported symptoms was not a valid reason to reject his opinion. The panel also held that the ALJ’s use of the opinion of a non-examining medical expert (which was BUCK V. BERRYHILL 3 rejected by the opinion of another non-examining physician) to reject Dr. Kenderdine’s opinion was not a valid basis for rejecting Dr. Kenderdine’s opinion. The panel held that the law of the case doctrine did not preclude this court from considering claimant’s arguments regarding the ALJ’s treatment of the opinions of Drs. Schechter and Fisher – where the district court, in a prior appeal, affirmed the ALJ’s treatment of those opinions and remanded for a second hearing before the ALJ – because the law of the case doctrine applies only to decisions by the same or a higher court. The panel held that the ALJ did not err in rejecting the opinion of Dr. Schechter where there was a discrepancy between the physician’s opinion and the physician’s own notes. The panel also held that the ALJ correctly interpreted Dr. Fisher’s opinion, which was submitted on a form, by relying solely on the third section of the form where the physician wrote his narrative opinion. The panel held that the vast discrepancy between the vocational expert’s testimony concerning job numbers and those tendered by the claimant was too striking, and concluded that the inconsistency in the record must be addressed by the ALJ on remand.
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