Age-adjusted disability rates and regional effects in Russia

We provide three measures of age-standardized disability rates for each Russian region and show that most, though not all, of the regional patterns in disability prevalence disappear with standardization. Disability prevalence remains unusually high for women in St Petersburg and Belgorod but the "remote but healthy" pattern is nearly gone. We conclude that differences in age structure largely account for the differences in disability prevalence across regions of Russia.