Major Metrics, Concerns, and Assessment Strategy for Mobility Assistive Devices

Abstract

The ageing of the population is one of the major societal and financial problems. The prevalence of disability increases dramatically by age. The loss of mobility can be devastating to the elderly. Mobility aids are a one-way street to maintain independent mobility. The performance of daily activities is restrained by a series of factors related to the assistive device limitations, or the ones emerged from environmental causes. A literature review reveals minimal tools for assessing mobility assistive devices able to capture users' satisfaction. The chapter presents an assessment methodology in order to investigate assistive mobility devices' limitations, dissatisfaction reasons, and identifies the most appropriate tools to study such limitations and conclude in valid outcomes. One of the valuable characteristics of the study presented in its generalizability since it is not disease oriented. A summary of the results from both the literature review and the real case study on a mixed group of end users are presented in the chapter.