[DO NOT PUBLISH]
IN THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE ELEVENTH CIRCUIT FILED
________________________ U.S. COURT OF APPEALS
ELEVENTH CIRCUIT
No. 11-13878 FEBRUARY 9, 2012
Non-Argument Calendar JOHN LEY
________________________ CLERK
D.C. Docket No. 8:10-cv-01668-TGW
KRISTIE REYNOLDS-BUCKLEY,
lllllllllllllll llllllllllllllllllllPlaintiff-Appellant,
versus
COMMISSIONER OF SOCIAL SECURITY,
llllllllllllll lllllllllllllllllllDefendant-Appellee.
________________________
Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Middle District of Florida
________________________
(February 9, 2012)
Before HULL, MARCUS and BLACK, Circuit Judges.
PER CURIAM:
Kristie Reynolds-Buckley appeals the district court’s order affirming the
Commissioner of the Social Security Administration’s (“the Commissioner”) denial
of disability, disability insurance benefits (“DIB”), and supplemental security income
(“SSI”), 42 U.S.C. §§ 405(g), 1383(c)(3). On appeal, Reynolds-Buckley argues that
the administrative law judge (“ALJ”) erred by discounting the medical opinion of Dr.
Nadim Khan regarding her heart condition. After thorough review, we affirm.
We review a Commissioner’s decision to determine whether it is supported by
substantial evidence and whether the proper legal standards were applied. Crawford
v. Comm’r of Soc. Sec., 363 F.3d 1155, 1158 (11th Cir. 2004). “Substantial evidence
is more than a scintilla and is such relevant evidence as a reasonable person would
accept as adequate to support a conclusion.” Id. (quotation omitted). “We may not
decide facts anew, reweigh the evidence, or substitute our judgment for that of the
Commissioner.” Dyer v. Barnhart, 395 F.3d 1206, 1210 (11th Cir. 2005) (quotation
and brackets omitted). We review the decision of the ALJ as the Commissioner’s
final decision when the ALJ denies benefits and the Appeals Council denies review
of the ALJ’s decision. Doughty v. Apfel, 245 F.3d 1274, 1278 (11th Cir. 2001).
The Social Security Regulations outline a five-step process used to determine
whether a claimant is disabled. 20 C.F.R. § 404.1520(a)(4). Under the first step, the
claimant has the burden to show that she is not currently engaged in substantial
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gainful activity. Id. § 404.1520(a)(4)(i). Next, the claimant must show that she has
a severe impairment. Id. § 404.1520(a)(4)(ii). She then must attempt to show that the
impairment meets or equals the criteria contained in one of the Listings of
Impairments. Id. § 404.1520(a)(4)(iii). If the claimant cannot meet or equal the
criteria, she must show that she has an impairment which prevents her from
performing her past relevant work. Id. § 404.1520(a)(4)(iii) and (iv). Once a
claimant establishes that she cannot perform her past relevant work due to some
severe impairment, the burden shifts to the Commissioner to show that significant
numbers of jobs exist in the national economy which the claimant can perform. Id.
§ 404.1520(a)(4)(v).
The Social Security Regulations also provide guidelines for the ALJ to use
when evaluating medical opinion evidence. See 20 C.F.R. § 404.1527. The ALJ
considers many factors when weighing such evidence, including the examining
relationship, the treatment relationship, whether an opinion is well-supported,
whether an opinion is consistent with the record, and a doctor’s specialization. Id. §
404.1527(d). Generally, the opinions of examining or treating physicians are given
more weight than non-examining or non-treating physicians unless “good cause” is
shown. See id. § 404.1527(d)(1), (2); Lewis v. Callahan, 125 F.3d 1436, 1440 (11th
Cir. 1997). Treating sources are given more weight because “these sources are likely
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to be the medical professionals most able to provide a detailed, longitudinal picture
of [the claimant’s] medical impairment(s).” 20 C.F.R. § 404.1527(d)(2). To qualify
as a treating source, the physician must have an ongoing treatment relationship with
the claimant. See 20 C.F.R. § 404.1502. We have found “good cause” to afford less
weight to a treating physician’s opinion where the opinion was conclusory or
inconsistent with the physician’s own medical records or where the evidence
supported a contrary finding. Lewis, 125 F.3d at 1440. The ALJ may discount a
treating physician’s report “when it is not accompanied by objective medical evidence
or is wholly conclusory.” Crawford, 363 F.3d at 1159 (quotation omitted). Because
our limited review precludes us from reweighing the evidence, when the ALJ
articulates specific reasons for failing to give the opinion of a treating physician
controlling weight, and those reasons are supported by substantial evidence, there is
no reversible error. Moore v. Barnhart, 405 F.3d 1208, 1212 (11th Cir. 2005).
In this case, regardless of whether Dr. Khan qualified as a treating source, the
ALJ had good cause and properly articulated reasons, supported by substantial
evidence, for assigning less weight to the opinion of Dr. Khan than to the
contradictory opinions of other medical professionals. Indeed, Dr. Khan’s opinion
was inconsistent with the medical evidence on the record and was not supported by
any treatment notes or by an analysis of any test results. Notably, Dr. Louis Castro,
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a cardiologist, indicated that Reynolds-Buckley was “really not cognizant” of her
heart racing when he examined her in 2007. After diagnosing Reynolds-Buckley with
persistent tachycardia and running numerous cardiac tests, Dr. Caruso recommended
only “risk factor modification and medical therapy.” In addition, Dr. Aliya Rathore’s
reports indicate that Reynolds-Buckley had been able to control her tachycardia by
taking medication. Moreover, after a monitoring test in February 2009 revealed that
Reynolds-Buckley had a normal baseline sinus rhythm with intermittent episodes of
sinus tachycardia, Dr. Sunil Gupta recommended only that Reynolds-Buckley take
beta blockers or calcium channel blockers, and did not indicate any restrictions in her
ability to work. Because Dr. Khan provided no independent treatment notes or
analysis of test results to support his conclusions about the severity of
Reynolds-Buckley’s condition, and those conclusions contradicted Dr. Gupta’s
test-supported conclusions from less than three months earlier, the ALJ did not err in
attaching little weight to Dr. Khan’s opinion.
Although Reynolds-Buckley argues that, based on the February 2009
echocardiogram, her condition had deteriorated when she saw Dr. Gupta in 2009
compared to when she first saw Dr. Caruso in 2007, she has not shown that her
disability had become so severe that it rendered her unable to work. McCruter v.
Bowen, 791 F.2d 1544, 1547 (11th Cir. 1986) (holding that “the ‘severity’ of a
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medically ascertained disability must be measured in terms of its effect upon ability
to work, and not simply in terms of deviation from purely medical standards of bodily
perfection or normality.”). Notably, the baseline rhythm of 89 beats per minute
recorded by the monitoring test was actually an improvement from the
110-beats-per-minute rate from the 2007 electrocardiogram, and Dr. Gupta did not
place any restrictions on Reynolds-Buckley’s ability to work. Finally, although
Reynolds-Buckley contends that the ALJ “cherry-picked” the medical evidence and
substituted his own judgment for that of the medical professionals, the record reflects
that the ALJ considered all of the medical evidence, including a questionnaire by Dr.
Khan, and Reynolds-Buckley has not shown that any medical evidence, aside from
Dr. Khan’s, contradicted the ALJ’s conclusion. Because the ALJ did not err in
weighing the medical opinion evidence, we affirm.
AFFIRMED.
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