THE EFFECT OF SEMIRIGID DRESSINGS ON BELOW-KNEE AMPUTATIONS

Background and Purpose. The effect of using semirigid dressings (SRDs) on the residual limb of individuals who have had below-knee amputatio ns as a consequence of peripheral vascular disease was investigated, w ith the primary question being: Does the time to readiness for prosthe tic fitting for patients treated with the SRDs differ from that of pat ients treated with soft dressings? Subjects. Forty patients entered th e study and were alternately assigned to one of two groups. Nineteen p atients were assigned to the SRD group, and 21 patients were assigned to the soft dressing group. Methods. The time from surgery to readines s for prosthetic fitting was recorded for each patient. Kaplan-Meier s urvival curves were generated for each group, and the results were ana lyzed with the log-rank test. Results. There was a difference between the two curves, and an examination of the curves suggests that the exp ected time to readiness for prosthetic fitting for patients treated wi th the SRDs would be less than half that of patients treated with soft dressings. Conclusion and Discussion. The results suggest that a pati ent may be ready for prosthetic fitting sooner if treated with SRDs in stead of soft dressings. [MacLean N, Fick GH. The effect of semirigid dressings on below-knee amputations. Phys Ther. 1994;74:668-673.]