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Life changing events

person in uniform
One of Dave Taylor's most memorable assignments in the U.S. Air Force was a United Nations mission in Haiti in 1996.

By Melanie Nelson, Public Affairs Officer

"I could put on a dress shoe and was able to dance with my wife"

Dave Taylor served 24 years in the U.S. Air Force. Two years before he retired, in 2013, Taylor was involved in a motorcycle accident that resulted in a below-knee amputation of his left foot. He was fortunate to have the Minneapolis VA Prosthetics Department take over his care in retirement, and that changed the course of his life. 

“I got involved in a slope adaptive study,” said Taylor, who was able to take a new prosthetic foot home as part of a research study funded by the Department of Defense. “I put that thing on, and it changed my life. I could put on a dress shoe and was able to dance with my wife and feel good in my body one more time,” said Taylor. 

The slope adaptive foot was originally developed by the Minneapolis VA’s Rehabilitation & Engineering Center for Optimizing Veteran Engagement & Reintegration (RECOVER). It is a hydraulic foot designed to adapt to various terrain without batteries or electronics.  

Since that study, Taylor felt compelled to give back to the Minneapolis VA, and became involved in many different research studies. For the past three years, he has also volunteered as a Certified Peer Visitor with the amputee clinic, an experience which led him to join RECOVER’s Veteran and Caregiver Engagement Panel (VCEP). VCEP includes 12 Veterans who’ve had an amputation or a spinal cord injury and one caregiver. The group meets monthly with researchers who bounce projects and ideas off of them to ensure their research is solving real problems that real Veterans have. 

Recently, Dr. Sara Koehler-McNicholas, associate director of amputation research within RECOVER met with the VCEP to get feedback about a proposed study design for a clinical trial.  “I was trying to figure out what outcome measures to use in the study. What questions should we be asking Veterans to ensure their prosthesis is meeting their needs? And how can we best understand how their prosthesis impacts their quality of life and participation in things they want to do,” said Koehler-McNicholas. 

Taylor shared some anecdotes from when he used the slope adaptive foot in the earlier study and could advise Koehler-McNicholas based on his own lived experience.  

Later this month, Taylor is scheduled to share his experiences with even more folks as part of a program during Minneapolis VA’s Research Week. He is part of a panel of diverse Veterans currently serving on VA Engagement Panels. Thursday, Jun. 26 at 11:30 a.m., following a keynote address in the Minneapolis VA Flag Atrium Auditorium, Taylor and others will share what it is like to be a part of VA research studies.  

Research Week is an annual opportunity to recognize VA researchers and their contributions to scientific studies and clinical trials that benefit Veterans as well as our entire community. Events are taking place all week long, see the schedule online.