Greetings! ,  

From all of us at Lyons Prosthetics & Orthotics we wish you and your family a very happy and safe holiday season! 

   

Lyons P&O will be closed December 24 & 25th and January 1st. 

 

We will be on call for emergencies only.  

 

Marilynn Wyatt, Naval Medical Center San Diego

are making artificial limbs stronger and lighter. They can be controlled using just a thought or a muscle twitch. They can even be re-engineered for rock-climbing or Olympic sprinting. But a continuing problem is that most prosthetic limbs don't provide sensory feedback to the user.

As you walk, muscles and neurons constantly send information to your brain about where your legs are, where your feet hit the ground, and how hard they push off. Without that feedback, it can be hard to coordinate movement. As a result, amputees who wear prosthetic legs commonly develop gait abnormalities such as shorter strides, slower walking speeds, and standing on tip-toe to swing the prosthetic leg.

"The lack of sensation can affect mobility and quality of life," says Zachary McKinney, a graduate student in biomedical engineering at UCLA. McKinney and his colleagues have been working on a simple feedback system that can be incorporated with almost any below-the-knee prosthetic leg. "Our goal is to improve sensory awareness of the prosthetic," he said at a meeting of the Biomedical Engineering Society in late October.

 

The healthcare law requires Essential Benefits to include Rehabilitative services and devices but this is not yet defined and could just mean durable medical equipment.

Q: Alex, I would love to see some reference information for amputees in Spanish! Do you know where I can find some?

 

A: The Amputee Coalition is a great resource. They have a lot of information written specifically for Spanish speakers.

 

Click here to check out the Materiales en español.