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Nature of Suit Code: 863
Nature of Suit: Social Security - DIWC/DIWW (405(g))
Cause of Action: 

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UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS Tent!l CJ.rCUl .. 

FOR THE TENTH CIRCUIT OCT O 2 1991 

SANDRA D. SQUIRES, 

Plaintiff-Appellant, 

v. 

LOUIS W. SULLIVAN, M.D., Secretary of 

Health and Human Services, 

Defendant-Appellee. 

) 

) 

) 

) 

ROBERT L. HOECKER 

Clerk 

) No. 91-1055 

) (D.C. No. 90-F-1359) 

) (D. Colo.) 

) 

) 

) 

ORDER AND JUDGMENT* 

Before ANDERSON, BARRETT, and TACHA, Circuit Judges. 

After examining the briefs and appellate record, this panel 

has determined unanimously that oral argument would not materially 

assist the determination of this appeal. See Fed. R. App. P. 

34(a); 10th Cir. R. 34.1.9. 

submitted without oral argument. 

The case is therefore ordered 

Plaintiff Sandra D. Squires (claimant) appeals from a 

district court order affirming the Secretary's decision1 to deny 

* This order and judgment has no precedential value and shall 

not be cited, or used by any court within the Tenth Circuit, 

except for purposes of establishing the doctrines of the law of 

the case, res judicata, or collateral estoppal. 10th Cir. R. 

36.3. 

1 The Appeals Council denied claimant's request for review on 

June 6, 1990, leaving the adverse decision of the Administrative 

Law Judge (ALJ) to stand as the final decision of the Secretary. 

Appellate Case: 91-1055 Document: 010110090725 Date Filed: 10/02/1991 Page: 1 
her disability insurance benefits and supplemental security income 

benefits. Claimant challenges both the determination that the 

existing record establishes her nondisability and the district 

court's denial of her motion to remand for additional evidence. 2 

Claimant's disability claim is based on the exertional and 

nonexertional limitations imposed by complications arising from a 

dog bite that fractured the fifth metacarpal bone on her right, 

dominant hand in late July 1987, when she was twenty-seven years 

old. In particular, claimant alleges she suffers from reflex 

sympathetic dystrophy (RSD) in her right hand and arm, which 

causes chronic, significant pain and drastically limits the use of 

her right hand for activities involving fine manipulation and 

grasping such as writing and computer work. 

The ALJ's determination of nondisability turned on the fourth 

step of the controlling sequential analysis, i.e., after finding 

that (1) claimant was not gainfully employed, (2) claimant 

suffered from severe impairments, and (3) claimant's impairments 

did not meet or equal one of the presumptively disabling 

impairments listed in the regulations, the ALJ concluded (4) that 

claimant was able to perform past relevant work and therefore was 

not disabled under 20 C.F.R. §§ 404.1520(e) and 416.920(e). See 

generally Bowen v. Yuckert, 482 U.S. 137, 140-42 

2 Shortly after the district court's affirmance of the 

Secretary's decision, claimant received notice from the Social 

Security Administration that on the basis of additional medical 

evidence, her disability was established as of July 1, 1990. She 

promptly moved for remand to the Secretary for consideration of 

that same evidence in this proceeding, which the district court 

denied, without comment, by minute order. 

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Appellate Case: 91-1055 Document: 010110090725 Date Filed: 10/02/1991 Page: 2 
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(1987)(sununarizing five-step evaluation process); Sorenson v. 

Bowen, 888 F.2d 706, 710 (10th Cir. 1989)(same). In arriving at 

this conclusion, the ALJ found that claimant could perform light 

work, so long as it did not require "long periods of fine 

manipulation with the dominant hand," and that "[c]laimant's past 

relevant work, as car rental sales representative, did not require 

the performance of work related activities precluded by [such] 

limitations." ALJ Decision of July 26, 1989, at 7. We review 

this decision to determine whether the findings are supported by 

substantial evidence and whether correct legal standards have been 

applied. Pacheco v. Sullivan, 931 F.2d 695, 696 (10th Cir. 1991). 

As stated in Social Security Ruling (SSR) 82-62, 

"[e]valuation under sections 404.1520(e) and 416.920(e) of the 

regulations requires careful consideration of the interaction of 

the limiting effects of the person's impairment(s) and the 

physical and mental demands of his or her PRW [past relevant work] 

to determine whether the individual can still do that work." 

Social Security Reports 809, 811 (1982). "Since the severity of 

the impairment(s) must be the primary basis for a finding of 

disability, evaluation begins with a determination of the 

claimant's functional limitations " Id. Virtually all of 

the medical evidence supports the ALJ's finding that claimant 

suffers from a mild RSD which restricts the functional use, 

especially the fine manipulation, of her dominant hand. Thus, the 

critical issue, at least as to the ALJ's dispositive step four 

determination, is whether this established limitation precluded 

claimant from performing the particular demands of her former work 

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Appellate Case: 91-1055 Document: 010110090725 Date Filed: 10/02/1991 Page: 3 
as clerk, sales representative, and manager of automobile rental 

operations. 

Claimant testified at the hearing before the ALJ that her 

prior work involved extensive writing along with computer work, 

"using your hand and your arm all day," which she can no longer 

do. Transcript of December 6, 1988 hearing (Tr.) at 14. This 

characterization is consistent with documentation submitted by 

claimant to the Secretary detailing the basic duties of her former 

occupation. See Appendix at 97-98. The only like evidence in the 

record is the following vague and equivocating testimony given by 

the vocational expert in response to the ALJ's inquiry whether 

claimant "could probably do the past relevant work" despite the 

impairment of her hand: 

Well, I think the question is the degree -- in an 

eight-hour day doing that the degree of writing, 

mixed in with the phone work, with filling in the blanks 

on rental contracts -- where it gets a little confusing 

is to what extent, you know, is the person truly writing 

in that capacity or, you know, I believe in filling out 

the disability report, there's some information on using 

a keyboard so now we're using a keyboard for 

information as opposed to writing, so it's a different 

type of action of the fingers. Obviously, based on her 

testimony, she feels that she could not do that because 

of the writing and I have some question on the degree of 

writing one does in a rental capacity, to that degree. 

Tr. at 26. The vocational expert's expressed confusion and 

uncertainty regarding the relative amounts of writing and keyboard 

work involved do little to undercut claimant's own description of 

the pertinent requirements of her former occupation, which is the 

recognized primary source for such information. See SSR 82-62, 

Social Security Reports at 811 ("The claimant is the primary 

source for vocational documentation, and statements by the 

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> 

claimant regarding past work are generally sufficient for 

determining the skill level, exertional demands and nonexertional 

demands of such work.") 

The medical evidence is virtually uniform in its support of 

claimant's asserted inability to return to her past work due to 

the demands it would place on her impaired hand. Dr. Happel, who 

is claimant's treating physician and whose views therefore must be 

given "special weight," Campbell v. Bowen, 822 F.2d 1518, 1523 n.5 

(10th Cir. 1987), has more than once related his opinion that 

claimant cannot return to her previous employment where so much 

writing and computer work was required on a daily basis. See 

Appendix at 152-53 (report dated April 27, 1988) and 175-76 

(deposition taken August 28, 1988). Even the physician retained 

as an expert defense witness in claimant's lawsuit over the 

dog-bite incident, Dr. Wilson, recognized when he saw claimant in 

March 1988 that the limited function of her right hand precluded 

claimant's return to her former job. See Appendix at 235-36 

(deposition taken October 17, 1988). Other physicians who saw 

claimant either reported symptomology 

work-related limitations discussed above, 

consistent with 

see Appendix at 

the 

266 

(June 21, 1989, report of Dr. Broky noting that claimant "has 

capabilities of writing, but not for prolonged periods of time, 

and must have periods of rest") and 256 (March 27, 1989, report of 

Dr. Dulla noting that claimant's allegations of pain are 

consistent with the clinical findings), or had nothing of any real 

relevance to say on this question, see Appendix at 259-61 

(December 22, 1988, report of Dr. Zoltan). 

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On the basis of both the medical and vocational evidence in 

the record, we conclude substantial evidence does not support the 

ALJ's finding that claimant is capable of performing the writing 

and computer work her prior occupation entailed. Cf. Jozefowicz 

v. Heckler, 811 F.2d 1352, 1358-59 (10th Cir. 1987)(reversing for 

lack of substantial evidence ALJ's step four nondisability 

determination which conflicted with medical evidence in record, 

particularly opinion of treating physicians). While the ALJ did 

note "that, significantly, no physician states that claimant is 

disabled," and that "[w]hile claimant may very well experience 

some pain, the undersigned finds that claimant's subjective 

symptoms are not found to preclude gainful activity and further 

that these symptoms do not support a finding of disability," ALJ 

Decision of July 20, 1989, at 6, neither of these points is 

pertinent to the dispositive question framed and decided by the 

ALJ, which is whether the medical record and vocational evidence 

considered together establish that claimant was precluded from 

performing her past relevant work. We hold that the denial of 

disability at step four was improper. 

Whether the exertional limitations and pain associated with 

claimant's condition rendered her disabled per se (at step five), 

i.e., whether there was a "significant number" of jobs in the 

national economy having requirements that claimant could still 

meet, ~ 20 C.F.R. SS 404.1566 and 416.966, remains an open 

question. The ALJ did not reach the issue in his findings, nor is 

the record so clear as to permit this court to resolve the matter 

in the first instance. Cf. Jozefowicz, 811 F.2d at 1359. The 

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vocational expert's response, "I believe so," to the only 

pertinent inquiry, "[a]re there any jobs available in the national 

economy. that could be performed by [claimant] with only the 

impediment of not being able to use the right dominant hand [i.e., 

completely ignoring her substantiated allegations of at least some 

significant, chronic pain and the undisputed work-related 

psychological limitations reported by Dr. Dulla3 J," is clearly an 

inadequate basis for a step five resolution for at least three 

reasons. First, a vocational expert's opinion regarding the 

claimant's work capabilities is probative only if it is premised 

on an accurate and complete characterization of the claimant's 

impairments. See Talley v. Sullivan, 908 F.2d 585, 588 (10th Cir. 

1990); ~, Douglas v. Bowen, 836 F.2d 392, 396 (8th Cir. 1987). 

Second, the cited regulations require the Secretary to establish 

that the claimant is able to perform a significant number of jobs, 

not simply that there is any job the claimant can do. See also 

Campbell, 822 F.2d at 1523 (to prevail at step five, Secretary 

must show claimant can perform "at least a substantial majority" 

of jobs in claimant's RFC). Third, the vocational expert's 

conclusory and vague affirmation that there is "any job" the 

claimant can still perform does not satisfy the Secretary's burden 

3 Dr. Dulla found claimant only mildly impaired in her ability 

to perform simple tasks and to relate to other people, but 

moderately so in her ability to perform complex tasks and to 

respond appropriately to co-workers, supervision, and the 

customary pressures of the workplace. See Appendix at 255-56. 

These medical findings were never disputed and were recited 

without qualification by the ALJ in the body of his decision. See 

ALJ Decision of July 26, 1989, at 4. 

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of demonstrating specific types of work activity within the 

claimant's limitations. See Williams v. Bowen, 844 F.2d 748, 751 

(10th Cir. 1988). 4 

For the foregoing reasons, we conclude that the denial of 

disability at step four in the controlling sequential analysis 

cannot stand and the case must be remanded for resolution by the 

ALJ at step five. In light of that conclusion, claimant's appeal 

from the district court's denial of her motion to remand for 

consideration of additional evidence is effectively resolved as 

well, since our remand should permit submission and consideration 

of the evidence in question. 

4 The Secretary also asserts in his brief that "[t]he 

vocational expert testified that he had previously placed 

individuals, such as plaintiff, who had 'reflex sympathetic 

dystrophy' in jobs with a 50% success rate." Brief of the 

Defendant/Appellee at 9. We deem the cited testimony to be of 

little, if any, significance for several reasons. It is patently 

ambiguous--asked what degree of success he had had in placing RSD 

patients, the vocational expert actually said, "[w]ell, in I 

believe about three or four cases, and one specific comes to mind 

that was successful in terms of returning a person to work and the 

remaining at least three or four other cases, it was not 

successful." Tr. at 25. This statement could just as easily be 

interpreted to assert that the vocational expert had succeeded in 

finding a job for only one of at least four or five other RSD 

patients. Moreover, there was absolutely no attempt to show 

which, if any, of these other individuals had symptoms comparable 

to claimant, which is a critical point when discussing a syndrome 

with the noted symptom-variability of RSD. Finally, the expert's 

testimony focused, inappropriately, on the anecdotal fortuity of 

his particular employment placements rather than on the objective, 

quantitative identification of occupations matching claimant's 

particular impairment profile. See Glassman v. Sullivan, 901 F.2d 

1472, 1474 (8th Cir. 1990)(discussing 20 C.F.R. § 404.1566(c)). 

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• The judgment of the United States District Court for the 

District of Colorado is REVERSED, and the cause is REMANDED to the 

Secretary for further proceedings consistent with this order and 

judgment. 

Entered for the Court 

James E. Barrett 

Senior Circuit Judge 

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