Rehabilitation for patients with paraplegia and lower extremity amputation

[Purpose] To study the characteristics and treatment strategy for patients with paraplegia and lower extremity amputation. [Subjects] Six cases were selected from among the patients admitted to the China Rehabilitation Research Center from 1991 to 2014. The criteria for the six cases were spinal cord injury with amputation immediately or in a short time (1 week) after the trauma. [Methods] General information, clinical diagnosis, treatment, rehabilitation and other data were analyzed. [Results] All the six cases were injured by high energy or complex energy accidents: two cases by falls after high voltage electric shock, one by an oil pipeline explosion, one by the impact of a falling tower crane and received high energy traffic accident injuries (one was hit by a train, and the other was hit by a truck at high speed). All the six cases had thoracic and lumbar vertebral injuries and complete paraplegia. Amputation stump infection occurred in four cases. After comprehensive rehabilitation treatment, patients’ functional independence measure (FIM) scores improved significantly, but American Spinal Injury Association (ASIA) scores and ASIA Impairment Scale (AIS) grades showed no significant improvement. [Conclusion] When formulating the clinical treatment and rehabilitation for spinal cord injury with amputation patients, simultaneous consideration of the characteristics of the spinal cord injury and amputation is needed to develop an individualized strategy. For spinal cord injury with limb amputation patients, prostheses should allow the improvement of patients’ self-care ability.