In the SIPP instrument, respondents are asked a series of disability questions that cover whether the respondent has difficulty performing certain activities due to a physical, mental, or emotional condition. All respondents aged 5 and over who have a value of 1 (“Yes”) for a previous disability question are asked to report the condition(s) that cause(s) difficulty with activities. Respondents can report up to three conditions.

These three conditions are used to construct several sets of recode variables in order to serve various data user needs: RCONDBRIDGE(1-3), RCONDTYP(1-3), and RCONDSUBTYP(1-3). If the value of the first condition variable is “None”, then the second and third condition variables are set to “Not in Universe”. Similarly, if the second condition is “None” or “Not in Universe”, then the third condition variables are set to “Not in Universe”.

Due to a processing error in the 2023 SIPP disability data, 53 cases have a condition-value for the third condition (variables RCONDBRIDGE3, RCONDTYP3, and RCONDSUBTYP3), but have a value of “None” for the second condition. While the third condition values in these 53 cases do not conform to the expected variable universe, it has been determined that they are valid values, and it is recommended that data users include these cases in their analyses of disability-related health conditions.