TY - JOUR AU - Landrum,Mary Beth AU - Stewart,Kate A. AU - Cutler,David M. TI - Clinical Pathways to Disability JF - National Bureau of Economic Research Working Paper Series VL - No. 13304 PY - 2007 Y2 - August 2007 UR - http://www.nber.org/papers/w13304 L1 - http://www.nber.org/papers/w13304.pdf N1 - Author contact info: Mary Beth Landrum Harvard Medical School Department of Health Care Policy 180 Longwood Avenue Boston, MA 02115-5899 Tel: (617) 432-2460 Fax: (617) 432-2563 E-Mail: landrum@hcp.med.harvard.edu Kate Stewart Department of Health Care Policy 180 Longwood Ave Boston, MA 02115 Tel: 617-432-3497 Fax: 617-432-2463 E-Mail: kstewart@mathematica-mpr.com David M. Cutler Department of Economics Harvard University 1875 Cambridge Street Cambridge, MA 02138 Tel: 617/496-5216 Fax: 617/496-8951 E-Mail: dcutler@harvard.edu M1 - published as Mary Beth Landrum, Kate A. Stewart, David M. Cutler. "Clinical Pathways to Disability," in David M. Cutler and David A. Wise, editors, "Health at Older Ages: The Causes and Consequences of Declining Disability among the Elderly" University of Chicago Press (2008) M3 - presented at "Economic Causes & Consequences of Population Aging", November 17-18, 2006 AB - This paper examines the pathways by which individuals transition from healthy to disabled. Because of the high prevalence and costs associated with disability, understanding these pathways is critical to developing interventions to prevent or minimize disability. We compare two estimates of disabling conditions: those observed in medical claims and conditions indicated by the disabled individual. A small number of conditions explain about half of incident disability: arthritis, infectious disease, dementia, heart failure, diabetes, and stroke. These conditions show up in medical claims and self reports. A large number of elderly also attribute disability to old age and various symptoms. Because so many of the most disabling conditions do not have clear medical treatments, the outlook for major reductions in disability might be limited. ER -