Abstract
Approximately 4.1 million parents (6.2%) in the United States have a disability. Understanding
the relationship between parenting and disability will prove useful when shaping policy and
research decisions.
In order to understand these relationships, we examined two sources of nationally
representative data, the National Health Interview Survey and the Medical Expenditure Panel
Survey. Included in these surveys was information on access to health care, service use, the
quality of health care, and the level of spending for adults in the United States living outside
institutions. These surveys allowed us to identify disparities in health outcomes for parents
with and without disabilities