NOT FOR PUBLICATION FILED
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS JAN 22 2021
MOLLY C. DWYER, CLERK
U.S. COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT
MICHELLE ALICIA SPEARS, No. 19-55195
Plaintiff-Appellant, D.C. No. 5:17-cv-02114-JPR
v.
MEMORANDUM*
ANDREW M. SAUL, Commissioner of
Social Security,
Defendant-Appellee.
Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Central District of California
Jean Rosenbluth, Magistrate Judge, Presiding
Submitted December 10, 2020**
San Francisco, California
Before: BOGGS,*** M. SMITH, and BENNETT, Circuit Judges.
Michelle Spears appeals the district court’s judgment affirming the denial of
supplemental security income by the Commissioner of the Social Security
*
This disposition is not appropriate for publication and is not precedent
except as provided by Ninth Circuit Rule 36-3.
**
The panel unanimously concludes this case is suitable for decision
without oral argument. See Fed. R. App. P. 34(a)(2).
***
The Honorable Danny J. Boggs, United States Circuit Judge for the
U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit, sitting by designation.
Administration. We affirm.
We have jurisdiction pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1291. We review de novo the
district court’s decision and “independently determine whether the Commissioner’s
decision (1) is free of legal error and (2) is supported by substantial evidence.”
Smolen v. Chater, 80 F.3d 1273, 1279 (9th Cir. 1996).
1. Spears argues that the Administrative Law Judge (ALJ) failed to
properly consider her mental impairments. In evaluating mental impairments, an
ALJ must rate a claimant’s degree of limitation in four functional areas: activities of
daily living; social functioning; concentration, persistence, or pace; and episodes of
decompensation. 20 C.F.R. § 404.1520a(c)(3) (2016). Here, the ALJ assessed
Spears’s limitations in each of those functional areas in determining the severity of
her impairments and her residual functional capacity (RFC). See Hoopai v. Astrue,
499 F.3d 1071, 1078 (9th Cir. 2007). The ALJ also discussed the 20 C.F.R.
§ 404.1545(c) factors that the record could plausibly support, such as Spears’s
limitation on interacting with others in the workplace. In addition, the RFC
determination was supported by the opinions of the state’s non-examining
psychiatrists, who assessed Spears against each of the § 404.1545(c) factors. Thus,
the ALJ properly considered Spears’s mental impairments.
The ALJ’s findings about Spears’s functional limitations are supported by
substantial evidence. The ALJ found that Spears needs only minimal counseling,
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which is supported by her progress notes from Mariposa Community Counseling.
The progress notes show that Spears was referred to counseling once and therapy
twice out of eighteen monthly sessions. The ALJ also found that Spears can drive,
which is consistent with her testimony that she drives around the block and has no
difficulty driving.
Accordingly, the ALJ did not err in considering Spears’s mental impairments,
and the ALJ’s findings are supported by substantial evidence.
2. Spears argues that the ALJ erred in giving limited weight to the medical
opinions of her treating psychiatrists, Dr. Heather Kurera and Dr. Sushma Sachdev-
Wali. An ALJ may disregard a treating physician’s opinion by giving “clear and
convincing” reasons if the opinion is uncontroverted, or for “specific and legitimate
reasons” if the opinion is controverted. Lester v. Chater, 81 F.3d 821, 830 (9th Cir.
1995).
Dr. Kurera opined that Spears was temporarily disabled for one year
beginning June 2014, and that she could perform no work. Dr. Kurera’s opinion is
controverted by the opinions of the state’s non-examining psychiatrists, who opined
that Spears retained the residual capacity to perform non-public, simple, repetitive
tasks. The ALJ discounted Dr. Kurera’s opinion because it was not consistent with
the conservative treatment provided to Spears. This is a specific and legitimate
reason, supported by substantial evidence from Spears’s subsequent progress notes,
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which detailed a conservative treatment regime of medication and minimal
counseling. See Ford v. Saul, 950 F.3d 1141, 1154 (9th Cir. 2020).
Dr. Sachdev-Wali diagnosed Spears with bipolar disorder and assessed her as
having a Global Assessment of Functioning (GAF) score of 30. The ALJ
acknowledged Dr. Sachdev-Wali’s bipolar disorder diagnosis but did not
specifically discuss Spears’s GAF score. But “GAF scores, standing alone, do not
control determinations of whether a person’s mental impairments rise to the level of
a disability (or interact with physical impairments to create a disability) . . . .”
Garrison v. Colvin, 759 F.3d 995, 1002 n.4 (9th Cir. 2014); cf. id. at 1002–05, 1014
(discussing GAF scores where the scores were accompanied by functional
limitations). Thus, Dr. Sachdev-Wali’s opinion is not significant or probative of
Spears’s ability to work, and the ALJ did not err in declining to consider part of
it. See Howard v. Barnhart, 341 F.3d 1006, 1012 (9th Cir. 2003) (finding that the
ALJ need not consider evidence that was “neither significant nor probative”).
Therefore, the ALJ did not err in discounting the opinions of Spears’s treating
psychiatrists.
3. Spears argues that the ALJ failed to consider the combination of her
physical and mental impairments. But the ALJ’s decision clearly states that the RFC
determination considered both Spears’s physical and mental impairments. Further,
the RFC limitations found by the ALJ are supported by the medical opinions
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evaluating both Spears’s physical and mental impairments. Spears’s argument that
the ALJ failed to consider the combination of her impairments fails.
4. Spears argues that the ALJ erred in finding that she could perform the
job recommended by the vocational expert (VE). The VE testified that a person with
Spears’s RFC and characteristics could work as an assembler of small products. An
assembler of small products “[f]requently works at bench as member of assembly
group assembling one or two specific parts and passing unit to another
worker.” DOT 706.684-022, 1991 WL 679050. At her hearing, Spears’s attorney
questioned the VE as to whether Spears’s limitation on interacting with coworkers
would restrict her ability to work. The VE confirmed that Spears could still perform
jobs involving bench work, as such jobs do not require being around many people.
There is no “obvious or apparent” conflict between the VE’s testimony and Spears’s
RFC limitations. See Lamear v. Berryhill, 865 F.3d 1201, 1205 (9th Cir. 2017).
Accordingly, the ALJ properly relied on the VE’s testimony to find that Spears is
able to work as an assembler of small products. See Gutierrez v. Colvin, 844 F.3d
804, 809 (9th Cir. 2016).
AFFIRMED.
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