C532 cooper stanbury et al - a standardised disability flag for australia.

1. A Standardised Disability
Flag for Australia
Poster 532
Mark Cooper-Stanbury and Jenny Hargreaves
Australian Institute of Health and Welfare

2. 2
Context
• Australian governments have a commitment to
promoting the rights of people with disability
• This includes the need to ensure that all mainstream
programs address the needs of people with disability.
• ‘Mainstream’ services and programs are those that
people encounter in everyday life – healthcare,
education, housing, transport, community services.
• Accurate identification of people with disability is
needed to monitor gaps in health and social
outcomes, and service use and needs.

3. 3
Development principles
• Data should be readily collectable
• The ‘Flag’ should be consistent with concepts
underpinning the ICF
• Data should be comparable among sectors
• Data should be meaningful – sensitive, specific,
broad
• Aligned with population disability data
• Use existing national standards where possible

4. 4
Development process
• Critical review of
– concepts underpinning ICF
– Survey and census-based instruments used by ABS
– International work, including WHO-DAS and
‘Washington Group’ questions
• Consulted with experts in disability concepts and
measurement
• Focus groups, cognitive interviews, pilot testing
• Each with inputs from people with lived
experience of disability

5. 5
Representation of the Flag
• A combination of two data elements:
– Person—activity and participation life area,
disability flag
– Person—need for assistance with activities in a life
area, disability flag
• Additional questions about participation in
work and education

6. 6
Representation of the Standardised
Disability Flag
• )
Always/som
etimes need
help and/or
supervision
Have
difficulty,
but don’t
need
help/superv
ision
Don’t have
difficulty but
use
aids/equipm
ent/
medications
Have no
difficulty
Self care x
Mobility x
Communication x
Learning, applying
x
knowledge
Managing things around
the home
x
Managing tasks and
handling situations
x
Personal relationships x
Community life x

7. 7
Outputs
• At individual or aggregate level:
– Extent of activity limitation
– Activity limitation flag (a summary of extent of
activity limitation)
– Extent of core activity limitation
– Education participation restriction flag
– Employment participation restriction flag
• Relevant metadata in ISO/IEC 11179 format on
AIHW’s METeOR metadata repository

8. 8
Meteor.aihw.gov.au

9. 9
Next steps
• Australia’s National Disability Strategy aims to have
a disability identifier in data for mainstream
healthcare, education, housing, transport and
community services
• Has been piloted with the Specialist Homelessness
Services data collection
• Currently being implemented in other housing
collections
• Discussions relating to healthcare and other sectors
yet to occur