Demographic and clinical characteristics of children with limb loss in Saudi Arabia: A retrospective study.

PURPOSE: The aim of this study was to describe the demographic and clinical characteristics of children with limb loss in Saudi Arabia. METHODS: This is a retrospective study on children attending a limb loss clinic in a tertiary hospital in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, between July 2012 and June 2020. Descriptive statistics were computed to describe the sample characteristics. A Chi-Squared test was conducted to explore the relationship between a child's sex with the type of limb loss (congenital or acquired) and extent of limb loss (major and minor) and the association between child's age and the mechanism of injury in traumatic limb loss. RESULTS: A total of 122 children aged 2-16 years were included of whom 52% were boys. Congenital limb loss represented 57% of the sample with upper extremity loss accounting for 63.7% of all limb loss in this type. Trauma-related limb loss represented the most frequent etiology (88.2%) in the acquired limb loss group. Road traffic accidents accounted for 51.7% of the mechanism of injuries in trauma-related limb loss. Child's sex was not associated with the type of limb loss nor the extent of limb loss ( p > 0.05). In addition, child's age was not associated with the mechanism of injury in traumatic limb loss ( p > 0.05). CONCLUSION: Child's sex was not a determinant of type nor the extent of limb loss. Most of the acquired limb loss was trauma-related with road traffic accidents as the most common mechanism of injury. The findings of this study illuminate the importance of ongoing prosthetic care for children with a limb loss because young children may require multiple prostheses as they grow in age and size.

Test-retest reliability of the Arabic translation of the Lower Extremity Functional Status of the Orthotics and Prosthetics Users' Survey.

BACKGROUND: The number of amputations secondary to diverse factors in Arabic countries is expected to rise in the coming years. Therefore, there is a need for high-quality service that can be monitored by the use of standardized patient-reported outcome measures of amputee patients' functional status. This study aimed to translate the Lower Extremity Functional status Orthotics and Prosthetics Users' Survey (OPUS-LEFS) to Arabic and test its reliability in a sample of Arabic-speaking people with amputation. METHODS: Standard forward and backward translation, followed by an examination by a team of experts, and then preliminary testing were conducted on the final translation. The OPUS-LEFS was cross-culturally validated, and its test-retest reliability was examined in patients with lower extremity amputations (N = 67). RESULTS: No issues were observed concerning the patients' understanding or the meaning of the items on the Arabic translation of the OPUS-LEFS. The intraclass correlation coefficient was 0.99 (95% confidence interval [CI]: 0.985 to 0.995), and the mean difference was -0.278 (95% CI: -5.83 to 5.28), indicating excellent test-retest reliability. CONCLUSIONS: The study's results suggest that the Arabic translation of the OPUS-LEFS is a reliable tool that can be recommended for future use as an outcome measure for patients from Arabic-speaking nations with little knowledge of the English language.