This review describes the concept of disablement, with particular reference to the World Health Organization’s International Classification of Impairments, Disabilities and Handicaps (ICIDH), and its forthcoming revision. Applications for a disablement classification are discussed, and the various approaches which have been applied to the measurement of disablement are reviewed. The relevance of disablement to psychiatric research and clinical practice is also addressed. In the second section of the review, data are presented from the last two phases of the Gospel Oak Survey, illustrating the value of simple measures of disablement in a community epidemiological study of the aetiology of late-life depression.