Defining childhood disability: ICF-CY developmental code sets.

Purpose: This study describes the development of four age-based item code sets from WHO's International classification of functioning disability and health, children and youth version (ICF-CY). Given the continuing goal of universal implementation of the ICF-CY, a reduced set of codes was identified from more than 1600 codes to facilitate the use of the classification for clinical, research and policy applications of the ICF-CY.

Methods: The ICF-CY developmental code sets were developed by consensus using the Delphi method. A multi-disciplinary group of international experts representing 27 countries from 5 WHO world regions completed a series of iterative online surveys to rate categories of child functioning essential for inclusion in the respective age-based code set.

Results: Four age-based code sets covering 37, 52, 60 and 57 codes across four domains of the ICF-CY were successfully derived with a high level of participant consensus. The code sets align with developmental theory and represent essential indicators of functioning defining key stages of child development.

Conclusion: The ICF-CY developmental code sets offer a common, universal language of childhood functioning and disability with global application for multidisciplinary research, clinical practice and policy.