A review of 42 patients of 16 years and over using the ORLAU Parawalker

Abstract

A 7 year retrospective review of 42 patients of 16 years or over using the ORLAU Parawalker has been conducted to establish the degree of long-term compliance in using the orthosis on a regular basis. Regular use was defined as putting the orthosis on at least once a week. All subjects had been supplied with an ORLAU Parawalker via the routine supply procedures adopted in Oswestry, and were followed up at regular 6 month intervals as part of the standard treatment regime. The records from routine follow-up were surveyed for those patients who were continuing to use their orthosis to establish age, length of time since supply of orthosis and cause of lesion. Average period of usage is calculated for those still using their orthosis, and for all patients in the study. Of the 42 subjects, 32 were myelomeningocele patients with confirmed absence of innervation of hip extensors and abductors, the remainder being paraplegic patients with traumatic or acquired complete thoracic lesions. Compliance figures were extracted from the results, as were the minimum possible average periods of usage. The respective results were: of the 32 myelomeningocele patients 59.4% continued usage after an average period of 85.5 months, and of the 10 traumatic or acquired lesion patients 60% continued usage after an average period of 24.8 months respectively, which gave a combined compliance of 59.5% after a minimum average 71.1 months of use. The performance of myelomeningocele patients suggests that their additional deformities do not lead to inferior compliance as adults and that a high proportion to continue to walk after adolescence.