10.1177/0898264304268589JOURNAL OF AGING AND HEALTH / November 2004Verbrugge & Sevak / DISABILITY AND SELF-SUFFICIENCY Disability Symptoms and the

Objective: Disability symptoms are tiredness, slowness, and pain doing daily tasks made difficult by health. The authors study factors that increase and decrease disabil-ity symptoms, especially effects of equipment and personal assistance. Method: In National Health Interview Survey Disability Supplement Phase 2, people with per-sonal care and household management disabilities were asked about fatigue, taking a long time, and pain when doing tasks on their own and with assistance. The authors study persons ages 55 and older. Results: Poor overall health or disability and severe disability in tasks increase disability symptom chances by 11 % to 18%. Assistance users are 19 % to 20 % less likely to have symptoms than nonusers. Personal help, alone, or with equipment, relieves symptoms better than equipment only, by 9 % to 13%. Discussion: Equipment-only users are self-sufficient, a highly prized situation. Because they actively engage in tasks, symptoms are still likely. This trade-off of psy