Step count levels during rehabilitation of British military amputees – a pilot study

Objective: The purpose of this pilot study was to ascertain the step count levels in lower-limb amputees within the British Armed Forces, both during and away from in-patient rehabilitation. The primary question was whether the mean daily step count changed when the amputee left the controlled rehabilitation process.
Results: 10 participants completed the study. The change in step count levels between in-patient and out-patient blocks was found to be significant (p=0.004) with a mean of 2296 +/- 1045 steps per day as an in-patient and 1354 +/- 715 steps per day as an out-patient. All participants were within three years of injury and 9 of the participants who completed the study were bilateral lower-limb amputees.
Conclusion: The results indicate a statistically significant drop in step-count levels between in-patient and out-patient blocks of data. However, this data gives an indication of what step count level can be achieved by multi-trauma amputees in the first three years of injury.