Relationships among impairment, disability, handicap, and life satisfaction in persons with traumatic brain injury

Four regional brain injury centers surveyed 758 individuals with loss of consciousness from head trauma who were living in the community. Relationships among demographic characteristics, severity of impairment, severity of disability, extent of handicap, and life satisfaction were assessed with multiple regression. While the demographic and impairment variables were relatively weak predictors of disability, the combination of these variables was a much stronger predictor of handicap. In turn, 13% of the adjusted variance in life satisfaction was accounted for by these variables. These results support the World Health Organization model of impairment, disability, and handicap and suggest that efforts to remediate disability have a direct benefit in reducing handicap and enhancing life satisfaction.