With the reduction on caseload due to the impact of multidrug therapy
(MDT) in most parts of India, we believe that there is a need to under
stand the epidemiology of disabilities in leprosy which may not necess
arily correlate with the distribution pattern of active disease. We pr
esent a methodology of data collection and verification taking the dis
trict as a unit to calculate the prevalence rate of disability as an e
xclusive entity in the district population, unrelated to the problems
posed by the communicable component of leprosy. This study indicated t
hat the prevalence rate of Grade II disabilities in 14 hyperendemic di
stricts was 0 . 82/1000, whereas it was 0 . 22/1000 in low endemic dis
tricts. Limb disability data collected from three hyperendemic distric
ts in Andhra Pradesh following task-oriented training enabled the para
medical worker to offer services to 5753 disabled patients after asses
sing the disability caseload per worker.