Perception of autonomy among people who use wheeled mobility assistive devices: dependence on environment and contextual factors.

Purpose: To evaluate and compare the perceived autonomy of people using wheeled mobility assistive devices (WMADs) in five community-based environments. To evaluate how personal, environmental, and assistive device-related factors impact the perceived autonomy of WMAD users.

Method: A study-specific questionnaire was used to evaluate perceived satisfaction of WMAD users with their autonomy in five environments: the Home Environment, Buildings Outside of the Home Environment, Outdoor Built Environment, Outdoor Natural Environment, and Transportation.

Perception of autonomy among people who use wheeled mobility assistive devices: Dependence on the type of wheeled assistive technology.

We evaluated perceived autonomy among users of different types of wheeled mobility assistive devices (WMADs) across five environments and identified the effect on user autonomy due to specific device characteristics. A study-specific questionnaire was used to assess satisfaction with autonomy of WMAD users in the Home, Buildings Outside of the Home, Outdoor Built, Outdoor Natural Environment, and Transportation. For each environment, 15 contextual factors were rated for their impact on participants' autonomy.