Preliminary evaluation of a commercially available videogame system as an adjunct therapeutic intervention for improving balance among children and adolescents with lower limb amputations.

Objectives: To examine the safety, feasibility, and balance performance effects of a 4-week home-based balance therapy program using a commercially available videogame system.

Design: A pilot study involving a preintervention and postintervention design was conducted with measurements taken at baseline, immediately postintervention (week 5), and at follow-up (week 13) for retention.

Setting: University hospital outpatient clinic and participants' places of residence.

Mobility function of a prosthetic knee joint with an automatic stance phase lock.

Background: There is a need for a prosthetic knee joint design that is technologically and functionally appropriate for use in developing countries.

Objectives: To develop and clinically evaluate a new type of stance phase controlled prosthetic knee joint that provides stance phase stability without inhibiting swing phase flexion.

Study Design: A crossover repeated measures study design comparing the new knee joint to the participant's conventional low- or high-end prosthetic knee joint.

Evaluation of a prosthetic swing-phase controller with electrical power generation.

With the increased presence of microprocessor-based prostheses in the market place, the availability of a self-energizing system has practical applicability. At present, most commercially available systems require the user to routinely recharge on-board batteries, which reduces the utility of these prostheses. To address this limitation, we have proposed a unique system based on an electromechanical generator to not only continually recharge batteries that are on-board the prostheses, but to also serve as a real time swing-phase damper.