Description

For all current or institutionalized persons, LADL indicates if the person receives help or supervision with Activities of Daily Living (ADL) due to an impairment or physical or mental health problem. This variable is constructed by AHRQ from three questions: a family-level screener question asking if anyone in the household receives help with ADLs, a question identifying which person/people, and a verification question asked about persons below age 13 to confirm that the help was the result of an impairment or physical or mental health problem.

Examples of ADLs include bathing, dressing or getting around the house. Help or supervision is defined as personal assistance physically doing the activity, guiding the person through the activity, making sure the activity is done correctly without harm, or staying nearby in case the person needs help in the activity. Examples of impairment given in the Field Interviewer's instructions include missing limbs, fingers, or other body parts; partial paralysis from an early case of polio, accident, or war wound; stiff joints, deformed fingers or other physical evidence of arthritis; and vision or hearing loss.

If no one in the family receives help or supervision with ADLs, all members of the family are coded as 'No' (1). For families that responded with 'Refused' (7), 'Not Ascertained' (8), or 'Don't Know' (9), all members of the family were assigned the family-level response. If the response to the family screener question was 'Yes' (2) but no family members were identified as receiving help, everyone in the family was coded as 'Don't Know.'

For persons under the age of 13, if the answer to the follow-up question regarding impairment, physical, or mental health problems was 'No', LADL is also coded as 'No'. Family members age 13 and older were not asked this final verification question.

Collection frequency and timing for LADL change over time. This variable was collected annually from 2017-2019 and 2022 forward. In other years, this question was fielded more than once a year and those responses are recorded in the variable LADLRD.

LADL is one of a series of variables about limitations and disability available in IPUMS MEPS. A complete list of these variables can be found in the description for ANYLMT.

Comparability

This variable is comparable over time.

Universe

Availability

• 2017-2019, 2022

Weights

• 2017-2019, 2022 : PERWEIGHT

Flags