Health Condition in Persons with Disabilities

Background:Persons with disabilities(PWD) have higher prevalence rate of the chronic disease and early-onset from poor health condition than persons without disabilities. The objective of this study was to compare health conditions between PWD and general population. Methods:Data was collected for the period from October to November 2010. A total of 1,011 subjects, persons diagnosed with disabilities(19 years of age and older), were recruited by purposive sampling from Rehabilitation Hospital, public health center and community centre. Data were gathered using a structured questionnaire based on the Korea National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey(KNHNES, 2009). In order to make comparisons on health condition between PWD and general population, data on general population were obtained from KNHNES and date on PWD were obtained from our study. Results: 43.4% of general population responded that their health status was either good or very good compared to only 20.1% of PWD. PWD also reported higher prevalence of chronic disease (60.6% vs 55.1%), stress (36.1% vs 31.0%) and depression (30.3% vs 15.0%) compared to general population. However, PWD showed a lower prevalence of current smoker (22.8% vs 26.6%) and use of alcohol (54.7% vs 75.7%) than general population. Discussion:Compared with the general population, PWD showed lower health conditions. Therefore, we will need to be explored potential strategies to reduce health disparities gap. In the Future, the continued measurement and surveillance of health risk factors will be critical to monitoring the effectiveness of programs or policies to improve quality of life among PWD.