In partnership with the United States Army Amputee Patient Care Program, the Amputee Coalition of America (ACA) published Military in-Step, a full-color, 100-page publication aimed at meeting the informational needs of returning military personnel with service-related amputations.

Based on the ACA’s award-winning publication First Step – A Guide for Adapting to Limb Loss, Military in-Step focuses on the new amputee and is divided into the following seven sections:

• The Military Amputee
• Caring for Yourself After Amputation
• The Prosthesis and Its Components
• The Rehabilitation Process
• Common Problems
• The Military Benefits System
• Sports and Recreation

This publication contains over 40 articles, personal profiles and vignettes that help show new military amputees that they can rebuild their lives, just as Army Sgt Garth Stewart, Army SFC Scott Barkalow and Army SSG Josh Olson have. In fact, some may even become active-duty personnel again. 

Hard copies are only available to military personnel through Walter Reed Army Medical Center (WRAMC) or Brooke Army Medical Center. However, this publication is now available to all as a PDF download through the Amputee Coalition of America’s Web site at www.amputee-coalition.org/military-instep/index.html.

Through its ongoing relationship with WRAMC and the Veterans Administration (VA), the Amputee Coalition of America has worked on several projects designed to educate healthcare professionals and the service men and women they care for who have lost limbs through trauma in conflicts abroad, accidents or disease. 

ACA President and CEO Paddy Rossbach, RN, who serves as a member of the Defense Health Board Panel on the care of individuals with amputation and/or functional limb loss, states, “Designing and developing Military in-Step has been a large part of this ongoing partnership to provide better information about limb loss to injured service men and women.”

In August 2002, approximately 100 military medical personnel, including doctors, nurses, physical and occupational therapists, and prosthetists, attended a full-day seminar at the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences (USUHS). Douglas Smith, MD, ACA’s medical director, Paddy Rossbach, RN, ACA’s president and CEO, and others presented an “Overview of Care for Amputees.” This seminar was followed in 2003 and again in 2004 by programs designed to update WRAMC nurses and VA healthcare providers on current practices in amputee care. 

Patricia J. Isenberg, MS, ACA’s chief operating officer and a master trainer, has also conducted peer visitation training programs at WRAMC to certify individuals to conduct peer visits to injured military personnel. Currently, there are approximately 250 visits per month to military amputees completed by 70 certified military peer visitors.

According to Rossbach, “While the Amputee Patient Care Program focuses on the full spectrum of care and management for the young, active, traumatic amputee patient, the ACA focuses on the empowerment of all amputees through education, support and advocacy.”

To learn more about the Amputee Coalition of America and how we can assist civilians and military personnel with limb loss, please contact us at 888/AMP-KNOW (888/267-5669) or acainfo@amputee-coalition.org.