Design and testing of an interim transtibial prosthetic leg for amputees living in rural areas: A case study
Document Type
Conference Item
Publication Date
1-1-2022
Abstract
An interim prosthesis is proposed to be used by amputees living in rural environment in situations where the amputee is in between prescribed prosthesis by an endorsed organization. The design and development of using the Polyvinyl Chloride (PVC) pipe as socket, bamboo to replace the common aluminum pylon and hand-crafted foot prostheses for people living in the rural area was performed and its performance were tested. Corn starch flour were used inside the socket to provide pressure distribution and cushioning effect in place of silicon gel. Tensile test on bamboo specimens revealed that the bamboo with tape could hold higher flexural load than bamboo without tape, and approximately 6 kN higher in the compression test. An amputee from a rural village performed gait testing with the interim prosthesis. The gait test revealed that despite the high strength of the bamboo pylon and the wooden foot, the breaking point of the prosthesis during gait was at the adapted which connected the socket and the pylon. Better load bearing adapter materials should be considered for the interim prosthesis, and further investigation is required in the actual rural setting to determine whether the prosthesis is appropriate for a rural patient to use. © 2022, Springer Nature Switzerland AG.
Keywords
Amputee, Gait, Lower limb, Prosthesis, Rural
Divisions
biomedengine,rehab
Funders
Administrator of Limbs For Life Prostheses Centre,Ministry of Higher Education, Malaysia [Grant no. GA022-2016]
Publication Title
IFMBE Proceedings
Volume
86
Publisher
Springer Science and Business Media Deutschland GmbH
Event Title
6th Kuala Lumpur International Conference on Biomedical Engineering, BioMed 2021
Event Location
Virtual, Online
Event Dates
28-29 July 2021
Event Type
conference