ISO 8549-1:2020

Prosthetics and orthotics - Vocabulary - Part 1: General terms for external limb prostheses and external orthoses

This document defines general terms used to describe external limb prostheses and orthoses, and the personnel involved in the practice of prosthetics and orthotics.

NOTE 1 The complete range of levels of limb amputation are listed and defined in ISO 8549-2. The complete range of classes of orthoses are listed and defined in ISO 8549-3.

This document does not apply to breast, ocular or other external prostheses used to replace other parts of the human body, nor to dental prostheses or orthoses.

NOTE 2 For the purposes of this document, the abbreviated term 'prosthetics' and its derivatives only apply to external limb prosthetics. The abbreviated term 'orthotics' and its derivatives only apply to external orthotics.

To comply with a standard, you need to quickly understand its issues in order to determine its impact on your activity.

The Requirements department helps you quickly locate within the normative text:
- mandatory clauses to satisfy,
- non-essential but useful clauses to know, such as permissions and recommendations.

The identification of these types of clauses is based on the document “ISO / IEC Directives, Part 2 - Principles and rules of structure and drafting of ISO documents ”as well as on a constantly enriched list of verbal forms.

With Requirements, quickly access the main part of the normative text!

The Redline + service - standards comparator allows you to easily and simply identify major changes between the current standard and its last canceled version.

At a glance, you will be able to identify the additions, deletions or modifications to a text, table, figure and formula.


The Redlines + service is offered to you on the collection of French standards in force, in French language and in HTML and PDF format.

For an overview of the service, click on View a standard in redline format

COBAZ is the simple and effective solution to meet the normative needs related to your activity, in France and abroad.

Available by subscription, CObaz is THE modular solution to compose according to your needs today and tomorrow. Quickly discover CObaz!

Request your free, no-obligation live demo

I discover COBAZ