Amputees to Receive Aid at Futuristic Center

Military Medicine, Winter 2005

Amputee soldiers may be able to return to battle, once the new state-of-the-art rehabilitation center opens at Walter Reed Army Medical center next year. The $10 million Military Amputee Training Center will have facilities designed to do everything to help amputees from walking household distances to running, rock climbing and returning to duty.

Equipment will include the typical treadmills and stationary bikes, but also weapons simulators, a climbing and repelling wall and military vehicle simulators to help soldiers adapt their prosthetics to driving tanks and trucks. In addition, the center will house a running track, obstacle courses and a one-of-a-kind hydraulic platform that will simulate different terrain. Computer labs will aid in teaching patients to control advanced prosthetics, and a gait lab will help them learn to run and walk again.

With advancements in battlefield protective gear that protects the torso, as well as improved battlefield medical care, soldiers who would've been killed in earlier wars are now able to survive after losing limbs. According to AMSUS member Col Jeff Gambel, clinical chief of the amputee clinic, "What we're finding in each subsequent conflict is there is an increased percentage of upper-extremity amputations." And at least 10 amputees treated at Walter Reed have returned, or are planning to return to their units, according to hospital officials.

Reference: "Futuristic Center to Aid Amputees", Washington Times, 20 November 2004.