Assessing Ambulatory and Non-ambulatory Community Mobility in People With Lower Limb Amputation

What this Trial Is About

Mobility is essential for daily life, helping people engage in social, work, and recreational activities. This research focuses on community mobility, which means moving around environments outside the home, in people who have had lower limb amputations (LLA). Many people with LLA face ongoing mobility challenges, with only a portion regaining enough ability to walk in community settings. The study aims to understand the combined use of walking and wheeled devices like wheelchairs or scooters, as previous research has mostly focused only on walking ability despite wheeled mobility being important for many. The study involves people with lower limb amputations who use prosthetic limbs and wheelchairs or scooters for mobility at least once a week. Participants will be provided education and devices to monitor their mobility, including a GPS data logger worn during waking hours and a thigh-mounted accelerometer worn continuously except during swimming. Various clinical measures related to amputation will be collected at the first visit, along with several questionnaires assessing quality of life, prosthesis use, cognitive status, and balance confidence. Participants will be involved in two visits where baseline assessments and device education occur, followed by 10 to 21 days of wearing monitoring devices to collect detailed data on their movement patterns. Researchers will analyze this information alongside clinical and questionnaire data to understand mobility behaviors better. The primary outcomes include quality of life, mobility scores, and spatial and temporal data from GPS and accelerometer devices. This information will help improve interventions and assistive technologies to enhance community mobility for people with lower limb amputations.

Assessing Ambulatory and Non-ambulatory Community Mobility in People With Lower Limb Amputation