[NOT FOR PUBLICATION–NOT TO BE CITED AS PRECEDENT]

United States Court of Appeals For the First Circuit

No. 99-1858

PAULINE NICHOLSON,

Plaintiff, Appellant,

v.

JOHN J. CALLAHAN, ACTING COMMISSIONER OF THE SOCIAL SECURITY ADMINISTRATION,

Defendant, Appellee.

APPEAL FROM THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT

FOR THE DISTRICT OF RHODE ISLAND

[Hon. David L. Martin, U.S. Magistrate Judge]

Before

Selya, Circuit Judge, Cyr, Senior Circuit Judge, and Lipez, Circuit Judge.

David B. Green and Green & Greenberg on brief for appellant. Margaret E. Curran, United States Attorney, Robin E. Feder, Assistant United States Attorney, and Nancy B. Salafia, Assistant Regional Counsel, on brief for appellee.

March 6, 2000 Per Curiam. Appellant appeals from the district

court's decision affirming the final decision of the

Commissioner of Social Security denying disability insurance

benefits under the Social Security Act. After carefully

reviewing the administrative record and the arguments of the

parties, we conclude that substantial evidence supported the

denial of benefits, essentially for the reasons given by the

district court in its Memorandum and Order dated May 20,

1999 and by the Commissioner in his appellate brief. We

make only the following additional comments relative to

claims of error not directly addressed by the district court

or the Commissioner.1

1. Appellant suggests that the administrative law

judge (ALJ) had an obligation to consult a medical advisor

to determine her onset date of disability, but we disagree.

Since the ALJ concluded that claimant was not disabled at

any time during the insured period, there was no ambiguity

as to the date of onset which needed to be resolved. We are

1 There is no need to address the question whether the new evidence given to the Appeals Council in support of the petition for review comprises part of the administrative record. Whether or not that evidence is considered, substantial evidence of record supported the denial of benefits.

-2- also unpersuaded by appellant's suggestion that the ALJ

erred in not recontacting her treating physician, Dr. Ralph

DiGiacomo, to clarify his opinion that claimant was totally

disabled. On this case record, which contains scant

objective evidence of disability, we think that the district

court reasonably suggested that the doctor based his

otherwise unexplained opinion on appellant's subjective

complaints of pain. For reasons adequately stated by the

district court and Commissioner, the ALJ properly determined

that her allegations of pain were not fully creditable.

2. Appellant is right that the functional capacity

reports by non-examining consulting physicians, which the

ALJ partly relied on in finding her not disabled, were made

before Dr. DiGiacomo saw her for hand and low back/leg pain

in December 1994 and March 1995. Nonetheless, we conclude

that those reports, both of which were supported by citation

to medical findings of record, retained considerable

reliability. This is especially true of the November 2,

1994 report by Dr. Stankiewicz, which was completed just two

months before the alleged onset date of disability. Dr.

Stankiewicz reviewed reports by Dr. John Przygoda, which, as

appellant herself states, "generally recorded abnormalities

consistent with those found by Dr. DiGiacomo" (appellant's

-3- brief, at page 13). In particular, Dr. Przygoda noted

claimant's arthritis, low back strain, leg cramps and

difficulty in bending, although he attributed her bending

difficulty to a different cause than did Dr. DiGiacomo.

Appellant has not shown -- or made any attempt to show --

that the limitation in lumbar motion which Dr. DiGiacomo

observed in March 1995, just before expiration of insured

status, constituted a significant impairment necessitating

a new functional capacity assessment. In addition, Dr.

DiGiacomo's findings relative to claimant's hand condition

were compatible with March 1994 findings by treating

physician, Dr. Vaughn Gooding, which both consulting

physicians considered and noted in their reports. Although

Dr. DiGiacomo found some minor Bouchard's nodes developing

in December 1994, his subsequent progress notes never

mentioned them again (or any hand pain or other hand

problem, for that matter). Hence, the ALJ would have been

justified in giving some weight to the consulting

physicians' reports, as he did. See Manso-Pizarro v. SHHS,

(1st Cir. 1996) (per curiam) (stating that a

functional capacity report is not necessary where the

medical evidence suggests a "relatively mild physical

impairment posing, to the laymen's eye, no significant

-4- exertional restriction"); Gordils v. SHHS,

(1st Cir. 1990) (per curiam) (concluding that, together with

the objective medical evidence, a functional capacity report

made before a later physical examination which failed to

find objective evidence of disability constituted

substantial evidence in support of the denial of benefits).

The decision of the district court is affirmed.

-5-