Summary: 43 year old female with long work history claiming disability based on fibromyalgia
Client profile: 43 year old female
Education: high school graduate and vocational training as a legal secretary
Past work: 13 years of work as a legal secretary and law office manager. Following this, she worked as home health care aide and as a document transcriptionist
Claim background: my client filed for benefits in July, 2011 alleging an onset date in the fall of 2009. A hearing was held in an Atlanta area hearing office in April, 2014.
Factors in our favor:
- claimant had a long, successful work history
- claimant was unable to perform duties of transcribing business voice recordings, yet several years before had received accolades for her paralegal work
- claimant met “profile” of fibromyalgia patient – a Type A, over-achieving female who worked long hours and who developed fibromyalgia after a physical trauma (in my client’s case, the trauma was several serious auto accidents)
Factors not in our favor:
- because of financial limitations the medical record was less complete than ideal
- there was no treatment by a rheumatologist
- we had no completed functional capacity form
- fibromyalgia cases are difficult and becoming more difficult
My strategy: in the absence of extensive medical records, I felt that our best argument would be to show that my client’s current cognitive state and energy level were significantly different than they were 7 or 8 years ago when she was thriving as a respected litigation paralegal and office manager.
Hearing Report: the hearing in this case started very late, over 90 minutes past the scheduled time. My client and I entered the hearing room and the judge began the hearing by introducing himself, the hearing assistant and the vocational witness. After accepting the case file into evidence the judge asked me for an opening statement, which I provided.
Next the judge began questioning the claimant, starting with background questions and moving into the substance of the case – why did she feel that she could not work.
My client explained that since her fibromyalgia became symptomatic about 7 years ago, she had a great deal of difficulty with concentration and stamina and is often fatigued.
I continued this line of questioning and asked my client to testify about her prior work as well as her most recent work attempts, to show that her capacity for competitive work has become greatly impaired.
After taking testimony the judge turned to the vocational witness and asked two questions:
I. Assume an individual who is the same age as the claimant with the same education and work history. Assume further
- she is limited to light work
- she should avoid ladders, ropes and scaffolds
- avoid extremes of heat and cold
- avoid high pressure, quota driven jobs
- only occasional crouching, stooping and kneeling
Could such a person perform the claimant’s past work?
A: No because paralegal work is a high pressure, quota driven job. However there are other jobs that fit within this profile, including small parts assembler and mail clerk.
II. Assume an individual who is the same age as the claimant with the same education and work history. Assume further:
- she is limited to light work
- she should avoid ladders, ropes and scaffolds
- avoid crawling, crouching, stooping
- occasional kneeling and balancing
- she needs a sit stand option
- she requires the use of a cane to walk
- her attendance would be poor due to pain
- poor capacity for overhead reaching
- poor ability to maintain attention and concentration
A: Based on these limitations there are no jobs this hypothetical person could perform
Conclusions: this case will turn on whether the judge accepts my client’s testimony as being reflective of her capacity, or whether he will find that the somewhat sparse medical record represents an non-disabling level of impairment.
