UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS 

FOR THE TENTH CIRCUIT 

_________________________________ 

JEFF TURNER, 

 Plaintiff - Appellant, 

v. 

COMMISSIONER, SSA, 

 Defendant - Appellee. 

No. 21-4060 

(D.C. No. 2:19-CV-00720-CMR) 

(D. Utah) 

_________________________________ 

ORDER AND JUDGMENT*

_________________________________ 

Before HARTZ, BACHARACH, and CARSON, Circuit Judges. 

_________________________________ 

Jeff Turner appeals from an order of the district court affirming the Social 

Security Commissioner’s denial of his application for disability insurance benefits 

under the Social Security Act. Exercising jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1291 and 

42 U.S.C. § 405(g), we affirm. Mr. Turner has not shown that the denial was based 

on an incorrect legal standard or was not supported by substantial evidence. 

* After examining the briefs and appellate record, this panel has determined 

unanimously to honor the parties’ request for a decision on the briefs without oral 

argument. See Fed. R. App. P. 34(f); 10th Cir. R. 34.1(G). The case is therefore 

submitted without oral argument. This order and judgment is not binding precedent, 

except under the doctrines of law of the case, res judicata, and collateral estoppel. It 

may be cited, however, for its persuasive value consistent with Fed. R. App. P. 32.1 

and 10th Cir. R. 32.1. 

FILED 

United States Court of Appeals 

Tenth Circuit 

February 15, 2022

Christopher M. Wolpert 

Clerk of Court

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I. BACKGROUND 

Mr. Turner was born in 1959. He earned an associate degree in data processing 

and, before applying for benefits, he worked various jobs including tool programmer, 

greens keeper, and medical-record clerk. 

In 2016 he filed for disability insurance benefits under Title II of the Social 

Security Act (the “Act”), alleging disability since October 2013 from loss of 

coordination in his left hand from a stroke in 1991, chronic obstructive pulmonary 

disease, and acid reflux. The Commissioner denied Mr. Turner’s claim at the initial 

and reconsideration stages of review, so Mr. Turner requested a hearing before an 

administrative law judge (ALJ). 

After a hearing at which Mr. Turner and a vocational expert testified, the ALJ 

issued a written decision that followed the five-step sequential evaluation process the 

Social Security Administration uses to review disability claims.1

 Based on the 

1

 We have described the five-step process as follows: 

Social Security Regulations mandate that the ALJ who 

determines a claim for benefits under the Social Security 

Act follow a five-step evaluation: (1) whether the claimant 

is currently working; (2) whether the claimant has a severe 

impairment; (3) whether the claimant’s impairment meets 

an impairment listed in appendix 1 of the relevant 

regulation; (4) whether the impairment precludes the 

claimant from doing his past relevant work; and 

(5) whether the impairment precludes the claimant from 

doing any work. If at any point in the process the 

[Commissioner] finds that a person is disabled or not 

disabled, the review ends. 

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testimony and Mr. Turner’s medical records, the ALJ concluded that Mr. Turner had 

“the residual functional capacity [RFC] to perform light work as defined in 

20 C.F.R. § 404.1567(b)” with certain restrictions, including limitations on his 

standing, walking, postural activities, and fine manipulation. Aplt. App. vol. II at 62. 

The ALJ found that Mr. Turner could “perform goal-oriented, but not fast-paced 

work such as production line work (due to the left hand, not due to any mental 

impairment).” Id. He further found that this RFC assessment was “not contradicted 

by any opinion from a treating or examining physician.” Id. at 64. In light of this 

RFC determination and the testimony of the vocational expert, he found at step four 

that Mr. Turner was capable of performing past relevant work as a medical records 

clerk. Accordingly, the ALJ found that he was not disabled within the meaning of the 

Act. 

After the Social Security Appeals Council denied Mr. Turner’s request for 

review and affirmed the denial of benefits, he filed an action under 

42 U.S.C. § 405(g), seeking review of the ALJ’s decision in the United States District 

Court for the District of Utah. He argued that the RFC determination did not 

sufficiently account for his fatigue. Among other things, he argued that the ALJ did 

not consider a portion of the treatment notes of Dr. Mustufa Saifee, a pulmonologist 

who examined him once in January 2018 and oversaw pulmonary-function testing 

Trimiar v. Sullivan, 966 F.2d 1326, 1329 (10th Cir. 1992) (citation, footnote, and 

internal quotation marks omitted). 

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several weeks later. Dr. Saifee’s notes of the January 2018 examination indicate that 

Mr. Turner “presented with dyspnea.” Aplt. App. vol. IV at 645. Mr. Turner 

described his symptom as breathlessness and said that it started many years ago and 

was ongoing. Dr. Saifee stated that “[t]he severity is NYHA class III.” Id. His notes 

do not explain what “NYHA class III” means, but Mr. Turner, citing material he 

found on the internet, argued that the term refers to a New York Heart Association 

classification for heart failure, indicating “[m]arked limitation in activity due to 

symptoms, even during less-than-ordinary activity, e.g. walking short distances (20—

100 m). Comfortable only at rest.” Id. vol. I at 25, 88, 100. 

The district court rejected the fatigue argument, pointing to other observations 

Dr. Saifee made in the same visit, such as his examination findings that Mr. Turner 

had a 96% oxygen level on room air, good respiratory effort, and clear breath sounds 

in both lungs. The court concluded that the “unexplained, unsupported reference to 

NYHA class III is not uncontroverted evidence that the ALJ chose not to rely on, nor 

was it significantly probative evidence that the ALJ could not reject without 

discussion.” Id. at 101 (internal quotation marks omitted). Concluding that 

substantial evidence as a whole supported the ALJ’s decision, the district court 

affirmed the decision of the Social Security Commissioner. 

II. DISCUSSION 

We review the district court’s decision de novo, applying the same standards 

that govern the district court. See Hendron v. Colvin, 767 F.3d 951, 954 (10th Cir. 

2014). We therefore review the ALJ’s decision to determine whether he applied the 

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correct legal standard and whether substantial evidence supports his factual findings. 

See id. “[T]he threshold for such evidentiary sufficiency is not high.” Biestek v. 

Berryhill, 139 S. Ct. 1148, 1154 (2019). “We do not reweigh the evidence or retry 

the case, but we meticulously examine the record as a whole, including anything that 

may undercut or detract from the ALJ’s findings in order to determine if the 

substantiality test has been met.” Flaherty v. Astrue, 515 F.3d 1067, 1070 (10th Cir. 

2007) (internal quotation marks omitted). “A finding of no substantial evidence will 

be found only where there is a conspicuous absence of credible choices or no 

contrary medical evidence.” Trimiar v. Sullivan, 966 F.2d 1326, 1329 (10th Cir. 

1992) (internal quotation marks omitted). 

1. Consideration of Dr. Saifee’s Notes 

Mr. Turner first argues that the ALJ’s RFC finding did not sufficiently account 

for the reference to “NHTA class III” in Dr. Saifee’s treatment notes, and that the 

ALJ owed this portion of Dr. Saifee’s notes deference as the opinion of a treating 

physician. We disagree. 

“[T]he regulations require that the ALJ give good reasons in the notice of 

determination or opinion for the weight that is given the treating physician’s 

opinion.” Doyal v. Barnhart, 331 F.3d 758, 762 (10th Cir. 2003) (internal quotation 

marks omitted). Contrary to Mr. Turner’s suggestion, however, Dr. Saifee was not a 

treating physician under the social security regulations. See 20 C.F.R. 

§ 404.1527(a)(2) (“Treating source means your own acceptable medical source who 

provides you, or has provided you, with medical treatment or evaluation and who has, 

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or has had, an ongoing treatment relationship with you.”); see also Doyal, 331 F.3d at 

763 (“A physician’s opinion is . . . not entitled to controlling weight on the basis of a 

fleeting relationship, or merely because the claimant designates the physician as her 

treating source.”). The record before the ALJ shows that Dr. Saifee examined Mr. 

Turner only once and then oversaw his pulmonary function testing several weeks 

later. There is no indication in the record that Dr. Saifee had “seen [Mr. Turner] a 

number of times and long enough to have obtained a longitudinal picture of [his] 

impairment, taking into consideration the treatment the source has provided and the 

kinds and extent of examinations and testing the source has performed or ordered 

from specialists and independent laboratories.” Doyal, 331 F.3d at 763 (internal 

quotation marks omitted). The ALJ was thus not required to discuss Dr. Saifee’s 

records in any more detail than he did. 

Nor was the ALJ obligated to treat a single line referring to “NHTA class III” 

in Dr. Saifee’s notes as an “opinion” under the Social Security regulations. 

See 20 C.F.R. § 404.1527(a)(1) (“[M]edical opinions are statements . . . that reflect 

judgments about the nature and severity of your impairment(s), including your 

symptoms, diagnosis and prognosis, what you can still do despite impairment(s), and 

your physical or mental restrictions.”). 

Finally, the ALJ did consider the records from Dr. Saifee, in their totality, 

along with other medical evidence. The ALJ’s written decision cites to the very page 

of Dr. Saifee’s notes that includes the reference to “NHTA class III.” The ALJ 

simply did not draw the same conclusions from the notes that Mr. Turner urges. Mr. 

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Turner’s challenges to the conclusions the ALJ drew from the record evidence ask us 

to reweigh the evidence, which we may not do on substantial-evidence review, see

Flaherty, 515 F.3d at 1070, and his disagreement with the outcome of the ALJ’s 

weighing of the evidence is not a basis for reversal of the ALJ’s determination. 

2. Reliance on Vocational Expert’s Testimony 

Mr. Turner also argues that the testimony of the vocational expert regarding 

past work “was too messy and inconsistent to rely on,” Aplt. Opening Br. at 6, so it 

does not support the ALJ’s finding that he could perform his past relevant work. We 

disagree because substantial evidence supported the ALJ’s decision at step four. 

“A claimant capable of performing past relevant work is not disabled within 

the meaning of the Social Security Act. The claimant bears the burden of proving his 

or her inability to perform past relevant work.” Andrade v. Sec’y of Health & Hum. 

Servs., 985 F.2d 1045, 1050 (10th Cir. 1993) (citation omitted). The vocational 

expert testified that an individual with Mr. Turner’s RFC would be capable of 

performing the jobs of, among others, medical-record clerk or outside deliverer, at 

least as those jobs are generally performed in the national economy. Relying on that 

testimony, Mr. Turner’s testimony about his work history, and information from the 

Dictionary of Occupational Titles, the ALJ concluded that Mr. Turner was not 

disabled. Mr. Turner’s disagreement with this analysis shows, at most, that it might 

be possible to draw different conclusions from the evidence than the ALJ did, but he 

falls well short of demonstrating “a conspicuous absence of credible choices,” 

Trimiar, 966 F.2d at 1329, so we cannot disturb the ALJ’s decision on that basis. 

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III. CONCLUSION 

We affirm the judgment of the district court. 

Entered for the Court 

Harris L Hartz 

Circuit Judge 

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