Discrepancy among Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System, Social Security, and functional disability measurement

Abstract

The Affordable Care Act (ACA) of 2010 (P.L. 111-148) Section 4302 requires the development of federal standards for the measurement of disability status in order to monitor health disparities and quality of care among this population. The validity and reliability of disability measurement instruments are important to all those who will use these data. The construct validity of BRFSS disability items is examined using a sample of adults who met the more stringent SSA definition of disability and compared to a seven-part functional disability question. Findings show that among 368 working-age adults with SSA-determined disabilities, the BRFSS disability questions had a sensitivity of 80.7%; 19.3% would not have been included in the state’s BRFSS disability prevalence estimate.