Evaluation of Activities of Daily Living Tesbeds for Assessing Prosthetic Device Usability

Abstract

Individuals with upper limb amputations rely on prosthetic devices to perform activities of daily living. However, these technologies are often reported as being difficult to use. Prior studies have used a variety of testbeds to assess the usability of prosthetic devices. However, there is no defined strategy for selecting the most effective batteries. This study developed a task selection strategy and a test battery to assess usability of upper-limb prosthetic devices. A combination of methods was applied, including a constrained literature review, sensitivity analysis, and review of fundamental upper-limb movements. Findings suggest that the clothespin relocation task (CRT) and Southampton hand assessment protocol (SHAP) are the most sensitive testbeds for usability assessment of upper-limb prosthetic devices and these tasks require similar limb movements to high frequency ADLs.