National Institute of Handicapped Research (NIHR): a giant step for expanded rehabilitation research.

The recently enacted Rehabilitation, Comprehensive Services, and Developmental Disabilities Amendments of 1978 (P .L. 95-602) amended the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 to establish a National Institute of Handicapped Research (NIHR) . This new Institute has charged with the prime responsibility of providing the required knowledge for defining needs, and of identifying the means for improving services to handicapped individuals . In addition, the amendments established as part of the Institute an Interagency Committee on Handicapped Research (ICHR), and a separate National Council on the Handicapped (NCH) . The legislative history and principal provisions of the new law were outlined by Roodzant and Clements in BPR 10-31, Spring 1979, 3 – 11. NIHR is the result of an intense effort, in recent years, by voluntary agencies of and for handicapped individuals, Congress, and the Administration . Its goal is to focus in one agency a strong commitment to carry on a major program of research on all aspects of disability and the attendant socio-economic implications of the problems encountered by handicapped individuals. The scope of activities prescribed for NIHR is all-encompassing, and cuts across practically every facet of rehabilitation and habilitation research activities imaginable, with no limitations in terms of type of disability, age, or intended goals . There was no intention to duplicate existing services, but rather to ensure that NIHR could proceed with full authority if research programs were found inadequate ornon-existent in a specific area of concern. The new Institute will retain most research programs previously