The National Health Interview Survey
The National Health Interview Survey (NHIS) is an annual nationwide survey of about 36,000 households in the U.S. conducted by the National Center for Health Statistics. It is a principal source of information on the health of the civilian non-institutionalized population. Disability identifiers were included in two years (1994/1995) of NHIS data collection and designated the NHIS-D. The NHIS-D was designed to collect data that can be used to understand disability, to develop public health policy, to produce simple prevalence estimates of selected health conditions, and to provide descriptive baseline statistics on the effects of disabilities. In the NHIS-D, disability is not limited to one definition of disability; rather, disability is viewed as the state of any short-term or long-term reduction in the ability to perform regular activities, resulting from either acute or chronic conditions (CDC, 2004).
The American Community Survey, first implemented in 2003, is an annual survey intended to displace the long-form version of the decennial Census. In these two Census Bureau surveys, disability is defined as a long-lasting condition such as blindness, deafness, or a severe vision or hearing impairment or a substantial limitation in basic physical activities such as walking, climbing stairs, teaching, lifting, or carrying. Severity of disability is determined through questions assessing the person’s capacity to: 1) learn, remember, or concentrate; 2) dress, bathe, get around inside the home; 3) go outside the home to shop or visit the doctor’s office; or 4) work at a job or business (USCB, 2005).
Another Census activity is the Survey of Income and Program Participation or SIPP. The SIPP is a continuing survey with monthly interviews of a multistage-stratified sample of the U.S. civilian non-institutionalized population. The purpose of SIPP is to collect income, labor force information, program participation and eligibility data, and general demographic characteristics to measure the effectiveness of existing federal, state, and local programs; to estimate future costs and coverage for government programs, such as food stamps; and to provide improved statistics on the distribution of income in the country. Under the SIPP, disability is defined as meeting one or more of the following criteria: 1) using a wheel chair, cane, crutch, or walker; 2) having difficulties performing functional activities; 3) having difficulties performing activities of daily living; 4) having difficulties performing instrumental activities of daily living; 5) having one or more specific mental or emotional conditions, or mental or emotional conditions that affect everyday living; 6) or having a condition that limits the ability to work around the house or at a job or business (USCB, 2004).