Identifying and linking prosthetic outcomes to the ICF framework: a step to inform the benefits measured in prosthetic health economic evaluations.
Leigh ClarkeEmily RidgewellMichael P DillonPublished in: Disability and rehabilitation (2022)
Lower-limb prosthetic research is focused on laboratory-based measures of gait. There are evidence gaps describing participation in real-world activities - important outcomes to inform policy and investment decisions that determine the prosthetic interventions available for people with limb-loss.Implications for rehabilitationCataloguing the outcomes used in prosthetic research to the International Classification of Functioning, Disability, and Health (ICF) allows important evidence gaps to be illuminated given the holistic description of function and disability.Establishing a comprehensive list of prosthetic outcomes, described using an internationally recognised framework with unified and consistent language, is an important steppingstone towards developing a core outcome set (COS) for prosthetic interventions and informing the benefits measured in future prosthetic health economic evaluations (HEEs).Being able to measure the benefits of a prosthesis that are most important to prosthesis users and funders has potential to fundamentally change future HEEs that influence funding policies, and ultimately the prostheses made available to people living with limb-loss.