ABSTRACT
Generally, functional/structural loss of upper extremity derives an impairment of 60% and lower extremity 40%. A person with isolated flaccid motor paralysis involving one lower extremity can walk independently with some gait deviation after stabilisation by surgery or by the appliance. A person with hip disarticulation/transfemoral amputation has loss of both structure and function. He/she cannot walk without an artificial limb. He/she can walk downhill, climb up the stairs, and run with microprocessor-controlled prosthetic knee joint though with some difficulty. But he/she cannot feel the sensation of his/her leg through the artificial limb. There is no mechanism to interpret the sensation in a person with amputation fitted with an artificial limb. He/she cannot feel the touch sensation through his/her prosthesis. Thus, it is not logical to give the same impairment of motor loss for combined motor loss, sensory loss, vascular loss, and dermal loss. Hence, “Integrated Evaluation of Disability” combines impairment of motor loss, sensory loss, vascular loss, and dermal loss to compute whole person impairment for an individual with amputation.
