Imitation movement reduces the phantom limb pain caused by the abnormality of body schema

摘要

Phantom limb pain is caused by the abnormality of the body schema. It is known that the mirror therapy is one of the most effective ways for reducing the phantom limb pain by using the visual information of the intact limb as the visual feedback of the amputated one, with looking through the mirror. This mirror therapy, however, works only for amputees with single limb amputation, because mirror therapy needs the vision of intact limb. Here, we tried to use the vision of the limb of another person as the visual feedback of the amputated limb by imitation movement and we reports that imitation movement could reduce the phantom limb pain of the amputee with bilateral lower limbs and left upper limb amputation by performing imitation movements.