Coreen L. SPRAGUE, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. Otis R. BOWEN, Secretary of Health and Human Services, Defendant-Appellee

How courts have described this case

Verbatim parenthetical descriptions written by other courts when citing this decision. Ranked by citation-network relevance.

• concluding that 7 family doctor was qualified to give opinion as to claimant’s mental state as it related to her 8 physical disability even if he was not a psychiatrist
• holding that disregard of lay testimony “violates the 13 Secretary's regulation that he will consider observations by non-medical sources as to how an 14 impairment affects a claimant's ability to work.”
• holding that primary care physicians can offer opinions on their patients’ mental health
• recognizing “it is well established that primary care physicians (those in family or general practice) identify and treat the majority of Americans’ psychiatric disorders”
• holding it was “clearly erroneous” for magistrate judge to conclude that psychiatric evidence “must be offered by a Board- 5 certified psychiatrist”
• recognizing 17 that the decision whether to remand a case for additional evidence, or 18 to award benefits, is within the discretion of the court after weighing 19 the appropriate factors

Source: CourtListener parenthetical corpus (CC0).