Visual Impairments: Determining Eligibility for Social Security Benefits

Annex Table A2b Sample Size of Noninstitutionalized Working-Age Civilian Men (Ages 25 to 61) in the Choice-Based Sample with Various Chronic Impairments, Diseases, and Disorders, 1983-1996
	Year
Group	1983	1984	1985	1986	1987	1988	1989	1990	1991	1992	1993	1994	1995	1996	Sum
No Visual Impairments......	19,018	19,154	16,561	11,286	22,453	22,731	21,553	22,469	22,502	23,771	20,743	21,864	19,118	12,175	275,398
Visual Impairments............	120	122	104	66	127	135	109	126	130	171	135	123	111	63	1,642
Blind in Both Eyes.............	27	16	20	11	18	22	19	25	28	33	22	25	18	10	294
Other Visual Impairments.....................	93	106	84	55	109	113	90	101	102	138	113	98	93	53	1,348
Vision-Related Diseases/Disorders...........	87	58	61	30	51	71	69	69	76	122	63	62	68	32	919
Glaucoma...........................	25	12	17	6	14	22	22	19	26	34	23	17	21	5	263
Cataracts............................	32	15	23	13	22	21	23	22	17	52	15	17	14	9	295
Color Blindness.................	7	6	1	3	3	2	1	3	6	12	2	3	7	2	58
Other Vision-Related Diseases/Disorders^a.........	27	25	24	11	12	29	25	30	29	32	26	27	29	17	343
Other Impairments
Hearing Impairments.........	100	87	74	50	116	107	93	2,278	103	118	90	104	76	55	3,451
Deaf in Both Ears..............	21	12	17	5	7	9	12	81	11	13	15	11	12	7	233
Other Hearing Impairments.....................	79	75	57	45	109	98	81	2,197	92	105	75	93	64	48	3,218
Mental Retardation............	65	41	45	42	64	90	67	82	75	109	96	78	77	54	985
Paraplegia, Hemiplegia, or Quadriplegia................	40	38	29	16	36	30	33	29	30	35	40	36	34	21	447
Cerebral Palsy....................	12	14	10	6	10	10	17	19	23	19	18	18	16	5	197
Note: In the NHIS, conditions are determined in two ways. First, participants receive one of six condition lists that ask them if they have a specific condition (see Table 1). Second, participants are asked broad questions to reveal general health and functioning (see Table 2, top panel), if participants reveal they have health or functioning difficulties, they are then asked what conditions cause these difficulties (see Table 2, bottom panel). This method misses those with conditions who have no such difficulties, while his first method captures those with conditions that have no health or functioning difficulties. So only one-sixth of the sample is directly asked about blindness. This one-sixth of the sample is a random sample because being asked about blindness is not dependent one's response to another question. The remaining five-sixths of the sample is choice-based because revealing blindness is dependent one's response (choice) to another question. ^{a The category other includes conjunctivitis, disorders of the lacrimal system, disorders of binocular eye movements, and diseases of the retina. Source: Author's calculations using the National Health Interview Survey, 1983-96.}

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