Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition
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| Brain scans related to "hidden consciousness" |
Michael Irving provided an explanation of the study that was published by New Atlas on August 16. Irving states:
After a severe brain injury, such as trauma or a stroke, patients can enter a state where they stop responding to stimuli in their environment, such as sound, light, pain and instructions. This can include a comatose state, which is like a persistent deep sleep; a vegetative state, where the patient may appear awake and even have their eyes open, but still don’t respond; and a minimally conscious state, where patients may even track movement with their eyes but can’t respond to commands.
But this doesn’t necessarily mean these patients aren’t at least partially aware of what’s going on. Over the past few decades scientists have detected signs of “hidden consciousness” in some unresponsive patients. In tests, instructions like “imagine opening and closing your hand” were given to patients while their brain activity was being monitored through functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) or electroencephalography (EEG).
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| Brain scans comparing consciousness. |
“Some patients with severe brain injury do not appear to be processing their external world,”
“However, when they are assessed with advanced techniques such as task-based fMRI and EEG, we can detect brain activity that suggests otherwise. These results bring up critical ethical, clinical, and scientific questions – such as how can we harness that unseen cognitive capacity to establish a system of communication and promote further recovery?”
Irving reported the findings from the study:
The new study examined 241 participants from six different facilities across the US, UK and Europe, over the past 15 years. They were all unresponsive in either comatose, vegetative or minimally conscious states, tested with fMRI, EEG or both, anywhere from a few days to years after sustaining their injury.
Intriguingly, the study found that as many as 25% of the patients were able to repeatedly follow instructions over the course of several minutes. That’s higher than the estimates raised in previous studies, which suggested 15 to 20%.
The authors admit that the research was not standardized and the methods for testing are complicated, nonetheless, the outcome is significant.
Many people who are unresponsive are denied beneficial treatment because the treatment is deemed to be disproportionate or extra-ordinary, based on the condition of the patient.
Some people, like Professor Peter Singer, deny that these people are persons because they have lost their cognitive ability.
These people are often referred to as "vegetative" are not only denied beneficial treatment but they are often denied food and water and intentionally killed by dehydration.
5 comments:
So this means organ donors may well know what is being planned for them, hear their families okay it, and since organs cannot be taken from the deceased, they have organs harvested while they are unable to do anything about it. I do not think people are given anesthesia. The horror. We should be rethinking organ donation.
It is for the reasons mentioned in this article that I believe there is no such thing as “Brain Dead”. When one’s heart still beats independently, one is alive. This diagnoses goes hand in hand with the organ harvesting industry, where fresh organs are needed. People who are declared to be brain dead are not given a chance to recover, but are whisked off to surgery, where they are anaesthetised while their organs are removed. Of course after that they are truly dead. There are doctors who query this practice without anaesthetic.
This happens often enough when a person sustains a head injury and is otherwise young and healthy. In their shock the parents agree to organ donation that is suggested to them.
Agreed!
I could have told people that. Actually, I have. Anyone who heard me tell the story of when I woke from a 10 day coma. My mom told me they were with me a lot of the time and she asked me if I could hear them. Apparently I said, No, but I could feel you."
I don't remember that conversation since that day/evening felt more like a dream to me than realiity, but mom told me about it when I was more cognisant and remember that discussion.
I don't know if I would have been found to be 1 of the 25% in this study, but I do know that my sense of touch was the last thing to go and based on what my mom told me, I was obviously still conscious of my family's presence. After all, the sense of touch is the last thing to go (from some reseearch studies, as well as personal experience).
As an RN who has worked in the critical areas of large hospitals and with dozens if not hundreds of hospice patients, I can assure you that many so-called "brain dead" patients are not dead, but can, if given appropriate support and care, return to an awake status and report things they remember about their time prior to recovery.
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