The 11th circuit has ruled recently in a case reported in the National Organization of Social Security Claimants’ Representative (NOSSCR) newsletter. That administrative law judge in a social security case cannot reject a treating physician’s opinion in a Fibromyalgia case based upon on lack of clinical findings. In a Fibromyalgia case a claimants subjective complaints of pain “are often the only means of determining the severity of patient’s conditions and the functional limitations cause thereby.” The court apparently understood that Fibromyalgia is extremely debilitating and the pain is a subjective determination by the patient.

-James E. Doern