Objective: To compare key-person method with census method on the prevalence of physically disabled students and to obtain the prevalence of the physically disabled students in rural community.

Method: Total 4,890 students of 20 schools in Kyungaido province were surveyed in 1997. Two-thousands and twenty-two students of 8 schools were surveyed by a census method and 2,868 students of 12 schools by a key-person method.

Results: The prevalence of the physically disabled students in rural community was 0.53% of the population. The prevalence of the physically disabled students was 0.69% by a census method and 0.42% by a key-person method. This result suggests that there is no significant difference in the prevalence of physically disabled students between the two survey methods (p＞0.05).

Conclusion: A key-person method is as effective as a census method for prevalence survey of physically disabled students in rural communities because of cost effectiveness and less personnel.

Keywords :Key-person method, Key-person method, Census method, Prevalence of physically disabled, Community-based rehabilitation