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Review
. 2020 May 19;3(1):33931.
doi: 10.33137/cpoj.v3i1.33931. eCollection 2020.

The Use of Physical Activity Outcomes in Rehabilitation Interventions for Lower Limb Amputees: a Systematic Review

A G Jamieson  1 , L Murray  1 , A Buis  1
Affiliations
Review

The Use of Physical Activity Outcomes in Rehabilitation Interventions for Lower Limb Amputees: a Systematic Review

A G Jamieson et al. Can Prosthet Orthot J. .

Abstract

Background: Interventions which have focused on improving the physical activity of individuals with lower limb amputation can be mostly categorized into behavioural-based and prosthetic-based interventions. The aim of this review was to assess the quality of these interventions, and to identify the key gaps in research in this field.

Methodology: The databases of Scopus, Pubmed, Embase, Medline and Web of Science were searched between September and December of 2019 for articles relating to physical activity, amputees and interventions. Articles were assessed quantitively based on internal validity, external validity and intervention intensity.

Findings: Sixteen articles (5 behavioural, 11 prosthetic) were assessed. Both approaches had comparable methodological quality and mixed efficacy for producing a significant change in physical activity outcomes. Almost all interventions used a simplistic measurement of activity as their outcome.

Conclusions: There is an insufficient amount of studies to assess the overall efficacy of behavioural interventions in regard to how they impact on physical activity behaviour. However, the increase of quality of the methodology in the more recent studies could indicate that future interventions will retain similar levels of quality. Prosthetic interventions have shown no major improvement in efficacy compared to similar reviews and may need to utilise more advanced prosthetic components to attain significant changes in physical activity. Activity outcomes should expand into more complex activity measurements to properly understand the physical activity profile of people with lower limb amputation.

Keywords: Amputation; Amputee; Exercise; Lower Limb; Lower Limb Prosthetics; Physical Activity; Rehabilitation.

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Conflict of interest statement

Mr. Jamieson receives grants from PAL Technologies Ltd as part of his PhD funding, PAL Technologies manufactures the ActivPAL which is one of the devices included in this review; co-author Dr. Arjan Buis is an associate editor at the Canadian Prosthetics & Orthotics Journal. Dr. Arjan Buis is also the main author of one of the reviewed articles.

Figures

Figure 1:
Figure 1:
Flowchart diagram of the screening process.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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