Motor Ability Assessment in Lower-Limb Amputees

This work investigates the necessary aspects for the motor ability assessment in persons with lower-limb amputation, following the evaluation approaches suggested by the World Health Organization. In the specific case of the lower-limb amputee patient, the assessement can be articulated on two different levels: a first general, concerning the motor ability and quality of life as a function of that (level of independence), and a second local one, concerning the specificity of each single prosthetic module which composes the entire prosthetic chain, in the relationship with the user's motor function. The general purpose is therefore to provide fact-finding and operational tools in order to identify an accurate and reliable methodology for the motor ability assessment of prosthetized lower-limb amputees, both during gait and stereotypic locomotor tasks. This methodology is intended to constitute a valid and conventionally recognized reference for the amputee rehabilitation team, both for the functional patient assessment and for the technical-clinical evaluation of the prosthetic modules used. The perspective purpose is to verify the extractability of parameters particulary sensitive to the variability of clinical aspects related to the the lower-limb amputee motor ability, that can therefore be measured by a simple, low cost, wearable instrumentation, making them intelligible and useful to the clinical team and exportable in a remote supervision context. The main aims of the present thesis can be summarized in: 1. Identification of parameters of evaluation sensitive to the motor ability changes in lower-limb amputee subjects; 2. Definition of experimental methodological protocols ad hoc for the functional evaluation of the subject and for the appropriateness of the single prosthetic components. The research activity of the present thesis has been oriented on different works, each of which presents various peculiar aspects for the identification of specific indices for the assessment of the lower-limb amputee’s motor ability.