Disability and the years of potential productivity lost: modifying the years of potential life lost and the investment-production-consumer model by disability level.

The full impact and the loss to society from disability are seldom evaluated. We suggest a modification of the years of potential life lost (YPLL) by the overall percentage of permanent disability to obtain estimates of years of potential productivity lost (YPPL). We compare YPPL with the maximal years of potential productivity of an individual by difference and ratio measures. We employ similar methodology to modify valued years of potential life lost (VYPLL) according to the investment-producer-consumer model. We demonstrate the methodology by an example using data on disabled veterans.