One of the FAQs on Prosthetics| How to adjust artificial limbs for beginners

Tips: The residual limb will shrink quickly after the first prosthetic limb is installed (especially for people whose amputation has not been long). Therefore, the second prosthetic limb must be replaced within one or two years. In order to reduce the economic burden, when installing the second pair, you can consider replacing only the upper part of the socket. That is to say, retain the components other than the socket as much as possible, and the cost can be greatly saved. After about three years, the residual limb will basically be in shape, the shrinkage will slow down relatively slowly, and the residual limb will not change much.

Part One of the "Guide to Frequently Asked Questions about Wearing Prostheses" - Essentials for First-time Wearers to Adjust Prostheses

1. When standing, keep your legs straight: your waist and knees should be straight. There should be no feeling of leaning forward or backward.

2. The weight-bearing points of the body should be evenly distributed. That is: after putting on the prosthesis, there should be no obvious pain anywhere from the socket around the knee, including the lower part of the prosthesis. Even if it is red from wear, there will be a slight pain, which should be evenly distributed.

3. Test the ankle: Rock back and forth a few times while standing. When the prosthetic limb is as stable as a house, there should be a slight "lean forward" range, which is crucial for going up and down stairs and up and down slopes.

4. Walking is mainly driven by the knee joint, but if the residual limb is long and the prosthetic limb is swinged in conjunction with the residual limb, the stride will be smoother and more natural.

5. Pay attention to the height of the heel. When changing shoes, try to keep the height at which the prosthetic device was originally adjusted. People who have not mastered the skills of self-adjusting prosthetic limbs should not change the height of the heel easily.

Visual inspection method: After putting on the shoes, using the 90-degree vertical scale as the ruler, the prosthesis should be slightly tilted forward, that is, the angle between the leg tube and the foot is about 80 degrees, which is more suitable for walking.

How to adjust the heel: If the heel is low, the body will always feel like leaning back, and the knees will be stretched too much when walking or standing for a long time. The knees will feel pain after walking for a long distance. At this time, the heel should be appropriately raised with thick leather (cut the thick leather into a semicircle, accounting for about one-half of the heel, and can be fixed with "AB glue"). If the heel is high, the body's center of gravity will always lean forward involuntarily, and it will obviously feel like the knees are not straight when standing. At this time, you should change to shoes with a lower heel.

In addition, firstly, choose a shoe size that is larger and easy to put on and take off; secondly, you should focus on choosing shoes with strong and wear-resistant soles. The most expensive part of wearing a prosthetic limb is the sole, while the upper is not easy to wear.

Special reminder:

Any new prosthetic limb is like a new big-leather shoe. It is hard and rigid, not so soft and fits the foot so well. When the prosthetic limbs are old and new, you will obviously feel that they still work well as the old ones, and they can be put on and taken off smoothly. So remember:

1. Do not go out for long distances wearing a newly made prosthetic leg (except for those who are wearing the first pair of prosthetic legs, of course). Because of the interval of several years (prosthetics have a life cycle), there will be changes in the residual limb that are difficult to detect with the naked eye, and there will be some degree of difference between the old and new prostheses. Therefore, it is impossible for you to adapt to your new prosthesis all at once. Once you go out and feel some kind of discomfort, such as a grinding pain, you have no choice but to suffer.

2. New prosthetics generally require a running-in period of two to three months or even longer before they can gradually adapt to it and be willing to wear it. Therefore, it is best to rotate the old and new ones before wearing new ones. That is: if you feel any discomfort with the new one, such as pain, replace it with the old one and wear it for a few more days. In this way, after the residual limb has no discomfort or pain, it can be replaced with a new one. After repeating this cycle, I gradually got used to it.

3. When wearing residual limb socks, especially those with long residual limbs, you should pay attention to leaving room on the sock head (i.e. in front of the broken end). The broken end of the residual limb should not be tightened by the socks, otherwise it will hinder the return of blood in the residual limb and cause pain in the limb.

For adults with a moderate amount of daily activity (excluding children, teenagers and people with strong manual labor during growth), wearing a pair of prostheses for 3 to 5 years is not a problem.

Generally speaking, after the initial stage of training, the prosthetic limb that has been adapted to it should have no pain or discomfort during long-term walking. Therefore, you can naturally maintain a straight gait, which means that the wider the body sway, the better.