A supportive medical opinion can help a disability case enormously. But your doctor’s statement that you cannot work does not stand on its own. Social Security reads it against your doctor’s own treatment notes, the examination findings, your reported activities, and everything else in the file.
Your testimony gets the same treatment. You can testify honestly and convincingly about fatigue, pain, or anxiety, and an administrative law judge can still discount what you said because other parts of the record look inconsistent with it.
A recent Ninth Circuit case, Yandrich v. Bisignano, No. 25-4027 (9th Cir. Aug. 11, 2026), shows both problems in one decision. It is unpublished and nonprecedential, so it does not bind Social Security judges outside the 9th Circuit (Alaska, Arizona, California, Hawaii, Idaho, Montana, Nevada, Orgeon and Washington). I am writing about it anyway, because in my opinion the rules it applies are national rules that reach every claim in every state. Thanks to my colleague Adriana de la Torre who wrote about the Yandrich case on her excellent LinkedIn feed.
A strong opinion can be undermined by routine treatment notes
Mr. Yandrich’s attorney submitted favorable opinions from three treating providers – Dr. Jamito, Dr. Wingate, and PA Bolden. The ALJ found all three unpersuasive: they were inconsistent with the “longitudinal record,” including those same providers’ own “unremarkable treatment notes.” The ALJ then credited the opinions of three other sources, Drs. Sacks, Ahn, and Melamed, as better supported. The Ninth Circuit affirmed.
That sequence is the shape most of these cases take. The claimant’s own treating sources lost out to agency sources who never actually treated him, and what beat them was their own charts.
That should worry anyone with a pending claim. An opinion can look airtight in isolation. A doctor writes that you cannot maintain attendance, cannot stay focused, cannot get along with coworkers, cannot finish a normal workday. This seems compelling. But you can still lose if the ALJ looks at the treatment notes and asks whether anything in them supports those conclusions. Continue reading →
If you are over age of 55 with orthopedic/musculoskeletal issues, there is a very good chance you fit the profile that will result in an approval by Social Security disability.
One of the most common misunderstandings I hear from clients and visitors to my 
When disability claimants first learn that turning 55 can dramatically change the outcome of a disability claim, they often assume it’s some kind of loophole, a kind of “soft retirement benefit” quietly built into the system. But it’s not that simple. What happens at 55 is more subtle, more structural, and far more revealing about how disability evaluation actually works.
One often-overlooked rule in Social Security disability cases can mean the difference between approval and denial—or even add thousands of dollars in back pay to your client’s award. That rule? The “Borderline Age” regulation. You can read the actual regulation at 
As all of you are undoubtedly aware, the federal government shut down on October 1, 2025 because Congress and the President could not come to an agreement regarding funding to keep the government open. The early indication is that this may last for some time. Understandably, this creates concern for our clients. Below is the best information available right now about how this might affect clients who are in the process of applying for benefits.
As a Social Security disability attorney, Lyme disease cases represent a complex, frustrating, and often misunderstood type of disabling chronic illness. While the acute phase of Lyme disease is widely recognized and typically responsive to antibiotics, a subset of individuals develop long-lasting symptoms—often referred to as “chronic Lyme disease” or “Post-Treatment Lyme Disease Syndrome” (PTLDS). These cases are challenging both medically and legally, particularly when pursuing Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI) or Supplemental Security Income (SSI) benefits.
When you are approved for Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI) or Supplemental Security Income (SSI), that approval is not necessarily permanent. SSA is putting increasing efforts into conducting Continuing Disability Reviews (CDRs) to determine whether you still meet the medical criteria for disability. Members of Congress – both Democrat and Republican – are encouraging SSA to conduct more reviews because the Social Security trust fund is running out of money and they see CDRs as a tool to keep the disability trust fund solvent, and to avoid making difficult political decisions about actually fixing the problem.